On February 23, 2012, I was aboard LAN Airlines flight 2022, which inaugurated Latin America’s first continuously guided flight from takeoff to landing using Performance-based Navigation (PBN) technology.  GE supported the Green Skies of Peru project, a collaborative effort among LAN, Peru’s air navigation service provider CORPAC and regulator DGAC, by helping to provide aircraft flying from Cusco to Lima a highly efficient, predictable flight path from liftoff of runway 10 in Cusco to touchdown on Lima’s runway 15.

The Green Skies of Peru project is a notable milestone in the global effort to modernize today’s obsolete airspace infrastructure to match the capabilities of today’s modern aircraft systems. Deploying a continuous PBN city pair flight path creates additional predictability and continuity throughout the entire flight, compared to a single PBN arrival or departure path, while solving operational challenges at the individual airports.

The GE-designed PBN departure, en-route, arrival and approach procedures will save participating airlines on average 19 track miles, 6.3 minutes (7 minutes actual), 450 pounds of fuel and 1,420 pounds of CO₂ emissions per flight. The new flight paths also enable increased capacity at Lima’s Jorge Chavez International Airport – a major hub in Latin America – while helping to reduce the carbon footprint at Cusco, the access point to the popular tourist destination Machu Picchu. LAN flies the route 11-17 times a day, depending on the season.

With the success of this demonstration flight, a formal trial will commence allowing the team to validate the benefits and the paths under various operating conditions and finalize the deployment plan.

In 2009, GE, in collaboration with IATA, designed and deployed Required Navigation Performance (RNP) approach procedures for LAN at Cusco to improve access into the airport that is flanked by the Andes Mountains. Prior to the RNP paths, it was typical for one or more of LAN’s 15-21 scheduled flights per day into Cusco to be delayed or diverted due to poor weather and low visibility. Since the RNP paths have been in use at Cusco, LAN has reduced cancellations from twelve to five, flight delays by 45% and un-stabilized approaches by 94%, per month on average. During the first year of RNP use at Cusco, more than 30,000 of LAN Peru´s passengers avoided flight cancellations or delays, thanks to the technology. With the success of the Cusco paths, LAN selected GE Aviation in 2010 to develop an RNP program at five other airports it serves, including Lima. 

I went to Peru to participate in and witness this historic event, the inaugural flight.  What I wasn’t expecting, was the amazing level of passion and enthusiasm at the personal level among the LAN personnel in particular.  It was more than what you’d see or expect in a business transaction or any mere technical demonstration.  At the reception following the flight, many speakers, beginning with the CEO of LAN, expressed their genuine excitement and enthusiasm over the transformation of their flying operations, and how those benefits translate into advantages for the people and environment of Peru.

It took me back to those enthusiastic days at Alaska Airlines 20 years ago.  I was 29 when I first started the work on the Juneau RNP project. And I celebrated my 49^th birthday just a day prior to the flight in Peru.  I had not thought of it this way before, but in a way I realized – spreading RNP around the globe has been my life’s work. 

I want to share part of a speech given at the reception by Captain Christian Staiger of LAN Airlines.  It captures for me the emotion of the day and paints a picture of what RNP does.

“People say that when a man lifts his feet off the ground, he shares his history with the rest of the world. Borders can’t be drawn on the sky, and we the aviators, have replaced them with a friendly greeting of welcome and farewell through our modern communications systems each time we cross a frontier.

When the sun god Inti decides to shine on our crops, it never asks who the growing wheat belongs to.  Migrating birds only look for warmth and a proper place to settle down their nests.  Navigators through history have always observed stars to plot their positions on the maps. Today some modern stars with precise electronic timepieces on board orbit our planet and can be observed from every corner on earth, day and night, on clear or clouded skies, available for every airplane with the proper equipment on board….

The flight has been perfect.  The shortest route possible is the one that has been flown.  The precision of the navigators is such that the maximum error is limited to the distance of a wingspan.  From this flight on, variance and dispersion can be eliminated.  If you allow my analogy, we can say that a straight railway line has been traced between these cities that can be used by all appropriate modern aircraft.

Today’s historic milestone has many passports.  We have chosen the sky that covers the land of Peru, to honor our sincere engagement with the environment.  The flight Cusco-Lima joins not only our aeronautical histories under a common brotherhood; it also does it with the histories of all cultures that have inhabited these lands.  The wisdom of our common Inca ancestors in dialog with scientific knowledge of present days.”

You can watch a demonstration of Green Skies of Peru here.

Click here to see photos.

Now that the dust has settled from last week’s release of PB13, it’s time to stake stock of the impact on the DoD’s plans for UAVs. As I mentioned in my previous blog, even before PB13 was released we knew the Air Force had made the decision to terminate procurement of block 30 Global Hawks in favor of the manned U-2 Dragon Lady and subsequent procurement of block 40 Global Hawks. Nothing new to report there, although we can certainly expect Northrop Grumman to continue to press the DoD for an alternative solution. So, here is the UAV breakdown for each of the services. Bean counters of the world, enjoy…

By and large the Air Force took the biggest hit last week. In addition to the aforementioned block 30 Global Hawk termination, the Reaper fleet will see substantial reductions, as the DoD decided to extend the service life of MQ-1B Predators. Also, the Air Force just announced that it has no intention of moving forward in the near term with MQ-X, the Reaper replacement program that was set to come online in FY17. Check out this article to read more and this photo to see an MQ-9A Reaper.

The Navy also did not escape completely unscathed. MRMUAS (Medium-Range Maritime Unmanned Aerial System) was canceled in lieu of the successful RQ-8B Fire Scout and its larger, more capable brother, the MQ-8C Fire Scout – click here to read more. Overall procurement for Fire Scout through FY16 is down compared to PB12 plans, but the Navy seems fully committed to long-term utilization of the platform. Similarly, BAMS will also see less procurement through FY16. See a photo of an MQ-8C Fire Scout here.

The story for the Army is slightly different. Although procurement is down overall for FY13, the numbers are well ahead of PB12 plans through FY16. The vast majority of that difference stems from increased purchases of the RQ-11B Raven. No Army UAV programs have been outwardly canceled as of yet, though it will be interesting to see what happens now that MRMUAS is no longer. The Army was essentially leveraging it as an AoA for a VTOL UAV. Check out this article to read more and this photo to see a RQ-11B Raven.

All in all, some winners and losers in terms of PB13 plans for UAVs. One program of note, UCLASS, remains a key focal point not only for the Navy, but also for the Air Force – click here to read more. Essentially, the Air Force will watch how UCLASS unfolds and then decide upon a follow strategy for UCAVs. Of course, this assumes only non-proprietary programs. Any programs and platforms in the classified world are…well… classified. See a photo of an X-47B UCAS-D Fire Scout here.

Fly safe,

Marc

Over the past couple of years we have witnessed one of aviation’s inescapable realities: its fortunes are clearly tied to the world economy… and it hasn’t been pretty. Business and General Aviation appears to have been hit particularly hard: I will always contend that the amount of productivity that bizjets, turboprops and piston aircraft generate is substantial and that use of these tools has often been mischaracterized as opulent. Yet, the lift that could have been generated by the introduction of new technologies doesn’t appear to have compensated for the downwards pull of macroeconomic gravity… with some notable exceptions and first among them is China.

China’s surge in prominence is significant in two ways. First (the obvious), it provides a new sales opportunities for airframers seeking to offset lower demand in North America and Europe. With GDP growth projected to stabilize in the vicinity of 8% annually, it is not hard to see the allure of China.

Second (the not-so-obvious), China’s surge in importance is paradoxically contrasted with an infrastructure that is lacking on several fronts. Not only is the number of airports inadequate to support the economy, particularly in its hinterland, but even the existing ones lack a solid MRO and FBO network. For a country whose current bizjet installed base barely broke the 100 count recently (yes, no missing zeros), the lack of an adequate support system would appear to be a substantial hindrance to adoption rates.

Yet, analysts appear to be in agreement that an installed base of 1000+ in China within a decade is within reach. The answer, as readers may have guessed, lies in the Chinese government’s intent to bridge the gap with a solid infusion of construction projects and decreased airspace regulation. China’s 12^th Five-Year plan specifically contains the following provisions:

“[…] promote the development of general-purpose aviation, reform the airspace management mechanism, and improve the efficiency of utilization of airspace resources. […]”

For those of us who are not proficient enough in Chinese to read the text in its original form, a number of sites such as this one offer a useful English translation.

If recent efforts by the government to continue fueling its economic growth and maintain the country’s prominence on the world stage are any indications, there should be no doubt that they will succeed and that airframers’ trust in bluer skies ahead are well placed.

The upcoming ABACE tradeshow in Shanghai at the end of March will be a good barometer: it promises to be better-bigger-bolder. The industry’s eyes will certainly be pointed eastward next month.

Back on June 30, 2011, DLR of Germany demonstrated electric taxiing using a novel fuel cell-powered electric landing gear (press release here and video link here). The premise of electric taxiing is to postpone engine start and using it as the source for propulsion and electricity while the airplane is still on the ground, turning the engine on once the aircraft is ready to take off. By doing so, this would help reduce fuel consumption and wear on the engine while the aircraft is sitting in queue waiting to takeoff, and now days the queue seems to get longer and longer.

This concept sounds great at first glance, but let’s dig a bit deeper. Fuel burn savings during taxi are really dependent on the proportion of time spent on ground taxi relative to the entire mission. For example, a 737 flight involves around 20% of its mission time on ground taxiing, while a 777 flight involves only 6%. Therefore, electric taxiing creates more value for a 737 versus 777 because the fuel consumption reduction due to electric taxi is greater on a 737 (~16%) than a 777 (~5%). The savings is not 20% for 737 because you still have to burn some fuel to power the electric motors, either through an APU or in the future, a fuel cell.

While ~16% savings is pretty significant, there are tradeoffs to consider. To start, one will have to offset the gain with the added complexity and weight of adding motors and related controls robust enough to handle the rigorous landing environment. Also, aircraft engines need to warm up prior to takeoff, depending on ambient temperature and whether it is the first flight of the day, so the real savings might be less than the 16%.

Are there other ways to achieve the same results? What about using ground tugs to tow aircraft to the runway? What do you think?