Flying with confidence

Remember when airports were crowded? The world’s skies and airports certainly are a little quieter now than they were pre-pandemic. Some airports had as many as one flight taking off or landing almost every minute. Those were the days! Yet, regardless of air traffic flows, when I get on a plane I have one thing in mind, and I am sure you do too: safety.

Yesterday was an exciting day for us at Thales. We saw the launch of our latest secondary radar, the RSM NG. Bringing to market new technologies in the current global environment is noteworthy, especially considering the challenges faced by the aviation industry today. However, this launch is a chance for me to accentuate that: 1. I believe there is light at the end of the tunnel regarding the pandemic, we will get back to travel, 2: ‘secondary’ is only a word. Especially when it comes to air passenger safety!

Now, you may be wondering what secondary radars are, what they have to do with air passenger safety, or why they are even necessary if there are already primary radars monitoring the skies. Let me explain. Secondary radars continuously interrogate the national airspace to understand what and who is passing through the airspace. They communicate with the aircraft transponders to collect their identity, altitude, speed…etc. In that sense, they support the primary radars, which detect aircraft ranges and bearings based on the pulses the radar sends and the echo the aircraft generate within the radar’s 360 degrees Line of Sight.

What is cool about the RSM NG radar is that it goes beyond your typical Monopulse Secondary Surveillance Radar (MSSR) architecture by combining 2 sensors in 1. So on top of the MSSR architecture there is an additional sensor that detects Automatic Dependent Surveillance - Broadcast (ADS-B). ADS-B is a system aboard aircraft that automatically broadcasts the precise location of the aircraft via a digital data link. Combining ADS-B with MSSR for the RSM NG brings immense value to air traffic controllers. For example, when an aircraft is on the runway, it is not allowed to respond to interrogations from the secondary radar. Meaning that the aircraft is tracked and locked on by the radar only after take-off. It takes a bit of time to initiate what we call, a track, on an aircraft and therefore a certain amount of time passes before the controller can monitor it on their screen. However, what is interesting is that airplanes on the ground can, and are allowed to broadcast ADS-B. Therefore, thanks to its ADS-B detection, the RSM NG is able to start tracking aircraft faster, at take-off. In addition, this radar continuously monitors the sky at 360 degrees which allows for even more precision regarding the positioning of the planes. This is safer as it enables controllers to see aircraft immediately and more precisely.

As you know, any type of data can be vulnerable to hackers – as we have seen in the news on many occasions and keeping this data safe is primordial. This is top of mind for our teams and we are going one-step further when it comes to cyber security for our radars. For example, the RSM NG radar features a virtual machine, which provides a unique interface for the control of Cybersecurity functions, while always preserving the radar’s operational behaviour.

Of course, ensuring such levels of protection for radar data would be of little relevance if air traffic controllers were unable to trust their reliability at all times! That is why the RSM NG has an availability above 99.99%, and, on average, a critical failure only every 80 000 hours. Which let me tell you is very impressive! The radar has no less than 10 patents and highlights the DNA of Thales, and my own (as you can probably tell by now), for technology and innovation.

On top of that, these systems function 24/7 and have a long lifespan so it has been designed to be easily maintained and, if necessary, upgraded to meet future safety regulatory requirements and make any complex upgrade as simple as possible.

After over a year of restricted travel, I am very much looking forward to the next time I will be flying, whether it is for business or for pleasure. So next time you get the chance to board a plane, think of safety as I do and of the technology on the ground that gives us peace of mind!