Subject: [NEXTEL-1] FAA Commissions WAAS Certified Equipment, Charts to Come

From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 05 Aug 2003 02:47:34 -0400

FAA Commissions WAAS Certified Equipment, Charts to Come

July 28, 2003
GPS World

On July 10, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) finally
commissioned the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS), designed
to improve the accuracy, integrity, and availability of GPS signals.

Based on a network of ground reference stations monitoring GPS satellite
transmissions and uplinking data for rebroadcast through geostationary
satellites, WAAS will enable suitably equipped aircraft to fly approaches
to airports under instrument flight rules (IFR). General aviation (GA) pilots
and business aircraft operators using airports without sophisticated
navigation aids and instrument landing systems (ILSes) comprise two of
the largest beneficiaries.

“Everywhere I go, GA pilots ask, ‘How can we get an ILS at our airport?’”
says Phil Boyer, president of the Airline Operators and Pilots Association
(AOPA), which has probably been WAAS’ biggest organizational support
for the decade that it has taken to bring the system on line. “WAAS is
the answer for providing precision approaches to all of those airports
where ILS just isn’t possible. And we can provide an approach with
vertical guidance to each runway end.”

But, even with the system’s initial operational capability in place,
practical use of WAAS still requires certification of avionics with vertical
navigation capabilities and approval of individual approach procedures.

“Once avionics are certified to receive the system’s full capability, WAAS
will allow precision instrument approaches at thousands of runways at
airports and airstrips that have little or no ground-based landing
capability,” says FAA Administrator Marion Blakey. “WAAS will also
provide improved en route capabilities because pilots can fly more direct
and shorter routes without depending on ground-based navigation aides.”

UPS Aviation Technology and Chelton Flight Systems have received
certification for WAAS avionics with horizontal navigation capability that
are on the market now. (On July 24, Garmin International announced a
definitive agreement to acquire UPS Aviation Technology.) Later this year,
these systems will be further certified to receive WAAS’ vertical
navigation capability, according to the FAA, and several other
manufacturers are currently working towards certification for WAAS
receivers.

But Boyer insists that the FAA still needs to spread the benefits of the
system so that it will be attractive for pilots to buy WAAS-capable
navigation equipment. “Now that FAA has turned on the signal, the
agency has to accelerate charting new approaches at those airports that
don’t have them now,” he says. “At the present rate, it will take 30 years
to chart WAAS approaches into all airports. FAA must take innovative
steps such as turning to the private sector to survey and design these
approaches.”

The commissioning came more than three years after the original
scheduled date and at a price considerably overbudget. Moreover, FAA
replaced the original technical target of Category 1 capability (decision
height of 200 feet with visibility of one-half mile) with a certified Lateral
Navigation/ Vertical Navi-gation (LNAV/VNAV) capability (decision height
of 350, visibility of one mile).

Later this year, a new procedure will be published for the full capability of
WAAS, resulting in approaches down to 250 feet above the runway in
3/4-mile visibility

http://www.gpsworld.com/gpsworld/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=64864

------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for Your HP, Epson, Canon or Lexmark
Printer at Myinks.com. Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US & Canada. http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5511
http://us.click.yahoo.com/sO0ANB/LIdGAA/ySSFAA/61FxlB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/