Installation of automatic dependent surveillance – broadcast (ADS-B) ground stations in China has begun as part of a project that will include outfitting about 160 training aircraft.
Alaska-based ADS-B Technologies has won a contract from the Civil Aviation Flight University of China (CAFUC) to install six ground-based transceivers (GBT) in Sichuan province and equip about 160 aircraft with Garmin GDL90 ADS-B universal access transceivers (UAT). ADS-B Technologies president Skip Nelson says the first GBT was completed this month at CAFUC’s main campus in Guanghan. Three Piper Seminoles have already been equipped by installing GDL90s in the tail.
Nelson says additional installations will begin in January and the contract will be completed by the end of next year. GDL90s will also be installed on the 42 new Cessna 172s CAFUC ordered this year for delivery in 2006. CAFUC will also receive over 100 handheld displays, which will be used by pilots to monitor traffic because there is not enough room in the cockpit to install new permanent displays.
ADS-B UAT technology was demonstrated outside the USA for the first time in July in a trial at Guanghan. Several hundred general aviation aircraft in the USA have UAT datalinks, including about 300 in Alaska that received the technology as part of the US Capstone programme and over 100 aircraft operated by Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.
BRENDAN SOBIE/SINGAPORE
Source: Flight International
