A publication of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association
Issue link: http://natca.uberflip.com/i/698751
The NATCA Surveillance and Broadcast Services (SBS) team includes: Eric Labardini (ZHU), National SBS Article 48 Rep, Craig Bielek (A90), Dan Hamilton (SFO), National Airport Surface Surveillance Capability (ASSC) Rep, Andrew Stachowiak (I90), and Tom Zarick (ZDV), National Interval Management Rep. ADS - B: As of this update 24,488 aircraft (roughly 15% of the NAS) are eq uipped to broadcast with ADS - B Rule compliant avionics in the NAS. The SBS PO rough estimate of avionics installation capacity nationwid e is 50,000 aircraft per year. With the January 1, 2020 deadline to equip quickly approaching, concern is high that equi page levels will fall short of the estimated tot al NAS fleet (100,000 - 160,000). Users that wait too close to 2020 may find that the availability of ins tallers falls short of demand. SBS and Flight Standards have been working to standardiz e how they count A DS - B traffic. The number above is a total of all ADS - B operators. However, it's been noted by AFS that the number includes a couple thousand that are double count ed due to registration changes. In addition, the number of non - compliant o perations may be aro und 4,000. Most of these non - compliant operators are filtered today via automation that reads the accuracy of their reports and rejects the ones that do not meet standards. ADS - B IOCs have been completed at all En Route (ER AM and MEARTS) facilities. 75 of 155 Terminal sites have reached their ADS - B IOC a nd 72 are operating on Fusion. The remaining Terminal sites are ARTS 2E sites awaiting an upgr ade to the ELITE (STARS) build. The Terminal ADS - B/Fusion transition proceed s in this order: Kick - off meeting, AD S - B Flight Inspection, ADS - B IOC, Fusion Operational Suitability Demonstration (OSD) , and Fusion Operations. The most recent and upcoming Terminal events: Gulfport (GPT) ADS - B/Fusion kickoff meeting June 1 Greensboro (GSO) OSD June 1 Atlantic City (ACY) AD S - B/Fusion kickoff meeting June 8 Greensboro (GSO) ADS - B IOC on June 11 Fairbanks (FAI) ADS - B/Fusion kickoff meeting June 21 As noted below, an issue with ADS - B avioni cs occurred at SCT on June 11. Fortunately, ADS - B avionics events are rare due to the fil terin g mechanisms already in place. However, no one should conclude that ADS - B is perfect any more than radar o r any other automation system. Problems do occur when standards for installation or configuration within aircraft or ground systems are not met. In those cases, the aircraft may report higher accuracy than actual and be accepted by automation. ADS - B is a cooperative surveillance source relying on the position information d etermined onboard the aircraft. Other issues have been flagged by ATC before, and Flight Standards d oes address them with the user. However, this is a reactive approach and leaves ATC vulnerable to safety compromising situations before they are fi nally addressed by the Agency. NATCA is calling for a change in the approach. We need a proactive, timely response, and the SBS Program Office has a Compliance Monitor in place today to flag avionics issues. The problem today is that this mountain of data collected by the Compliance Monitor has to be culled through by a handful of Flight St andards ADS - B speciali sts at the headquarters level. Instead, NATCA proposes that the Compliance Monitor feed directly into the SBS network via automated means to reject non - compliant aircraft from ADS - B servic es. This would not prevent avionics issues fro m occurring, but it would prevent repeat offenders from impacting our operations. In addition, ADS - B enhanced validation parameters need to be closely monitored by the SBS network