Originally Posted by
727forever
I know we have found this aircraft, but it still seems the organisation representing 84% of global traffic is in no big rush to come up with a solution to aircraft tracking, looks like as some have said the Govt (US in particular) will make the changes for them. As for the Transponder's I hear you ask?? yep no changes there, we won't be going to automated transponders, so a terrorist who accesses the cockpit (or the pilot) can still turn them off in flight.....seems like we have learn't nothing since 9/11.
The IATA needs to act sooner rather than later I think. Maybe the insurance companies might put some pressure on them to act?
From Wilkipedia:
The International Air Transport Association—an industry trade organization representing over 240 airlines (representing 84% of global air traffic)—and the United Nation's civil aviation body—the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)—are working on implementing new measures to track aircraft in flight in real time. The IATA created a taskforce (which includes several outside stakeholders) to define a minimum set of requirements that any tracking system must meet, allowing airlines to decide the best solution to track their aircraft. The IATA's taskforce plans to come up with several short-, medium-, and long-term solutions to ensure that information is provided in a timely manner to support search, rescue, and recovery activities in the wake of an aircraft accident. They were expected to provide a report to the ICAO on 30 September 2014, but on that day said that the report would be delayed citing the need for further clarification on some issues.
In May 2014, Inmarsat said it would offer its tracking service for free to all aircraft equipped with an Inmarsat satellite connection (which amounts to nearly all commercial airliners)
Back onto the hamster wheel again
Aircraft already have sufficient tracking. ADS-B and ADS-C and ELTs
The SATCOM companies will provide free comms for tracking. After MH370 the SATCOM companies said that simple ADS-C tracking reporting would be free.
After AF447 the French BEA recommended a reporting rate of close to a minute for ADS-C when aircraft are on flights over ocean or sparsely populated areas.
There is more than sufficient bandwidth for tracking. Both INMARSAT and Iridium (and several other satellite comms companies) have more than sufficient bandwidth for the tracking.
Iridium AIREON plans Space Based ADS-B tracking a hosted payload on Iridium Next low-earth-orbit comms satellites will be looking down and receiving the normal ADS-B transmissions from the
mandated ADS-B position reporting systems. This means that aircraft out of Line of Sight for ADS-B will still be seen from the satellites. So in the current case instead of ADS-B disappearing when the aircraft went below the horizon it would have been visible all the way to the surface or until power failed.
Engine Manufacturers Track their Engines The major aeroengine manufacturers have reporting from their engines that tell the manufacturer where the aircraft is amongst a whole host of other data.
Airframe Manufacturers provide Tracked Health Monitoring so that any maintenance problem is pre-declared to the destination airport so first line maintenance can be carried out quickly when the aircraft arrives
It is simplicity itself to track an aircraft the equipment is fitted to all recent aircraft and will be mandated as retrofit to older aircraft in the near future.
The problem is that the aircraft operators switch the tracking off or decide not to use it and in MH370's case the pilot (or someone in the cockpit) appears to have switched off the tracking. EVEN THEN the aircraft was tracked albeit laboriously by looking at the Network layer handshakes between the aircraft SATCOM and INMARSAT.
All this continual galloping on the tracking hamster wheel does is get avionics manufacturers salivating about the profits from providing yet-another-tracking-gizmo for all aircraft at huge expense to the airlines and to their passengers who will have to pay for the unnecessary electronics:
it will NOT improve tracking of aircraft.
What would improve tracking of aircraft is mandating that the existing tracking systems are always used. This mandate action and the associated Notices of Proposed Rule Making are all working their bureaucratic way through the system. Mainly to assist in the future airspace ConOps than for the 2 or 3 occasions when aircraft are 'lost' in both meanings of the term.