ATOP & the future of ATC
 

Last week I attended a conference, during which was presented a briefing on ATOP implementation in Oakland, Anchorage and New York Oceanic airspace.

It is awesome!

Controllers sit at workstations that are "stripless" and have such features as Conflict Probe and Data Link to work aircraft over the "Deep Ocean" airspace. They see targets just as if there were a radar antenna every couple hundred miles all across the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. It is truly a revolution in how we control airplanes!

The thing that makes it more exciting - the whole thing was initially developed in New Zealand; it was an excellent advance in technology and the rest of the world is jumping on the bandwagon. The training in the U.S., for example, is a cooperative effort between American and New Zealand controllers with many classes being taught by the "Kiwi's." It's a splendid example of how international cooperation works for the benefit of all!

ATC 24/7

My God !!!
conflict alert, data link , ADS, and all this without strips !!....


I wonder what they will invent next !...

ATC WATCHER
OK, you gotta understand, where I work we use a ratty old plotting board, dull crayons, 5 bays of strips and ARINC messages to seperate Oceanic traffic.

Gosh, an Etch-a-Sketch would impress me. :p

ATC 24/7

Well Christmas is coming. Who knows....perhaps Santa will have an etch-a-sketch in his sack for you!:p

Seen the "radar" display some years ago at Auckland Centre. It looked like a normal display.. until the guy showing me pointed out "That's Tokyo up there, and Los Angeles across there.. and we're down here.." and I noticed that the aircraft were hardly moving. Absolutely amazing piece of kit..