Juneau brings aviation safety to the world
The Federal Aviation Administration wants to take its most modern aviation technology nationwide, and eventually worldwide, after having pioneered it in Juneau.
The Next Generation Air Transportation System, or NextGen, moves aircraft control from sometimes-finicky radar to a precise satellite-based system. That enables aircraft equipped with the new gear to fly into Juneau in weather a radar-guided approach would not allow, and puts a wealth of new information into the cockpit with pilots.
"Giving pilots more information makes them safer, and lets them operate more efficiently," FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt said in Juneau Thursday, touting the new system in the city where it was pioneered.
"It gives pilots the same situational awareness air traffic controllers would get anywhere they are," Babbitt said.
NextGen uses Global Positioning System technology to locate planes and tell pilots precisely where they are, where other planes are, and what the terrain is.
That technology has been a huge boon to Juneau, with one of the world's most terrain-challenged commercial airports. In the mid-1990s Juneau was equipped with Capstone, the predecessor to NexGen and began getting the benefits of the new technology.
"It's made flying in and out of here so much easier," said Alaska Airlines pilot Mike Adams at the Juneau International Airport Thursday.
"It's like following a little highway through the sky down to the runway," he said.
The new technology, he said, makes it preferable to fly into mountainous Juneau over airport without the technology.
Instead of radar sweeping the sky, transponders on aircraft flying into Juneau now transmit each plane's precise location, made possible by new ground antennas to improve communication.
That's made it safer to fly into Juneau. Last year, the new technology allowed 776 arrivals and departures that couldn't have happened before Capstone, said Alaska Airlines spokesperson Bobbie Egan.
After Capstone was pioneered in Juneau, it was expanded to other challenging airports, including Wrangell, Ketchikan and has just been installed in Southwest Alaska.
Now, Babbitt said, the FAA is ready to take the technology they're calling NextGen nationwide, and bring the benefits everywhere else.
"Much of what we're deploying today was pioneered here in the Capstone environment," he said.
Alaska Airlines' Bobbie Egan said more than half of Alaska's airports now have the new technology, as well as many others.
Better access to Juneau has saved Alaska airlines 250,000 gallons of fuel, and $15 million, Egan said.
In parts of the country that don't have Juneau's terrain and weather issues, NextGen makes landing approaches shorter, especially in instrument-landing approaches in poor weather.
Current instrument-landing technology allows only lengthier straight-in approaches, often costing time and money, Babbitt said.
"We can design curved approaches - Juneau is a wonderful example of that - you can't do that with the traditional old ILS equipment," he said.
For Alaska Airlines, the fuel savings are part of its new "Green Skies" initiative, but those new landing approaches can also enable jets to avoid residential areas, minimizing noise complaints.
"The business case makes itself," Babbitt said.
Because aircraft travel through the world, he's hoping a common standard will develop for the new technology.
All aircraft will someday have transponders, a transmitter that transmits out information about a plane's location. More advanced models will have the ability to provide pilots with information about every other plane in the area.
That provides pilots and air traffic controllers with much better data.
"Rather than a radar sweeping the sky looking for blips, every airplane will know its position exactly and broadcast out that information," Adams said.
In Juneau, that's particularly important because of all the mountains blocking radar coverage, he said.
They can also provide pilots with the latest weather information. Much more even than planes equipped with their own weather radar have, Babbitt said.
"Even weather radar that's in the airplane simply isn't as good as a collection of radar information that's stitched together and sent to the airplane," he said.
And aircraft-borne radar only looks forward, he said, making it difficult for a pilot to know whether he should turn around because of bad weather ahead.
"If you make a decision to turn around, you have no idea what's developed behind you until you've turned around," Babbitt said.
• Contact Pat Forgey at 523-2250 or patrick.forgey@juneauempire.com.