Stakeholders from across air traffic management recently came together at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport to validate the SESAR’s airport operations centre (APOC)*. They made use of a portable gaming platform to confirm how different stakeholders can collaboratively manage airport operations in both normal operations and adverse conditions. The exercise was carried out by Groupe ADP/Paris Aéroport, Airbus, Airport Research Center, DSNA and EUROCONTROL.
The exercise took place between 29 March and 4 April and was based on EUROCONTROL’s portable APOC gaming platform which had been physically moved to the Parisian airport in order to ensure the full involvement of operational staff. This was considered by participants as a pioneering approach to accelerating the deployment of future operational solutions, such as APOC.
The gaming exercise tested for the first time an interactive performance dashboard, which allowed airport operational experts to pilot the platform in real-time. While a detailed analysis is ongoing, the exercise nevertheless confirmed the critical importance of airport collaborative management covering the aircraft and passenger processes within a “total airport management” approach. It also showed that an airport can be managed using tools such as the APOC performance dashboard. Further exercises will test other decision-making support tools, such as a “what-if” tool.
Such exercises allow the operational community at an airport to have a first-hand view of the APOC-related developments taking place in SESAR. They will also feed into the refinement of the APOC reference documentation associated to the airport operations management focus area.
Gérard Batistella, Director SES Single European Sky (Groupe ADP), said: “This exercise managed by EUROCONTROL, culminates many years of work under SESAR 1 on the operations of an airport. Based on a high fidelity simulation representing Charles de Gaulle airport, the exercise had the advantage of taking into account not only the airside operations but also the landside operations based on the Terminal 1, bringing together the operational staff who will be using the new concepts to be deployed in Europe.
The performance improvements assessed during the exercise, will be useful in the future to improve passenger experience and whilst benefiting airlines’. The SESAR2020 programme will further refine the improvements for SESAR Deployment”.
*Within SESAR Project 06.03.01 / OFA05.01.01.
Watch below a video of the exercise