Turbulence detection transformed by data tracking

by CHIEF CORRESPONDENT, TOM BALLANTYNE  

December 1st 2018

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It is a perennial problem for airline operations and the leading cause of injuries to cabin crew and passengers in non-fatal accidents. Read More » Turbulence, mostly unpredictable and often occurring in apparent cler air, costs the airline industry millions of dollars a year, estimates the International Air Transport Association (IATA).

To improve the safety from turbulence, the global airline association has launched a Turbulence Aware data resource to help airlines avoid turbulence when planning routes tactically in flight.

IATA’s head of the Meteorological (MET) Program, Katya Vashchankova, said the tool augment’s an airline’s ability to forecast and avoid turbulence by real time pooling and sharing turbulence data generated by participating airlines.

At present, airlines rely upon pilot reports and weather advisories to mitigate the impact of turbulence on their operations, she said. There is no standardized scale for the severity of turbulence, which means pilot reports of turbulence can range from moderate to severe in scale, but can vary widely between different aircraft types and experience of cockpit crews.

Turbulence Aware will collect information from contributing airlines and consolidate it into a single, anonymous and objective source database that is fed into an airline’s dispatch or airborne alerting systems for action. It is the first global, real-time, detailed and objective information source for the management of turbulence.

“Turbulence Aware is a great example of digital transformation in the airline industry. Airlines have always cooperated on safety, their number one priority. Now Big Data is turbocharging what we can achieve,” said IATA.

In the case of Turbulence Aware, the more precise forecasting of turbulence will provide a real improvement for passengers, whose journeys will be even safer and more comfortable,” said IATA director general and CEO, Alexandre de Juniac.

A number of carriers, including Japan Airlines, China Southern Airlines, Cathay Pacific Airways and Qantas Airways are participating in the tool’s development as members of an advisory council.

The first operational version of the platform was developed this month. Operational trials will take place from February to December next year with a full launch of Turbulence Aware in January 2020.

IATA said the challenge of managing turbulence is expected to grow as climate change continues to impact weather patterns, which have implications for both safety and efficiency of flight.

“As we progress to having accurate turbulence data available at all flight levels, pilots will be able to make much more informed decisions about higher flight levels with smoother air. Being able to climb to these altitudes will result in a more optimal fuel burn, which will ultimately lead to reduced CO₂ emissions,” IATA added.