Eurocontrol Shares Air Traffic Data with Netherlands Air Force - Bill Carey

Eurocontrol’s Maastricht Upper Area Control Center (Muac) is supplying air traffic data to the Royal Netherlands Air Force (RNLAF) in a project designed to better coordinate civil and military flights in some of Europe’s busiest airspace. Eurocontrol said the data-sharing system has started initial operations with 11 military controller and two supervisory positions.

Under the terms of a cooperation agreement Eurocontrol and the Netherlands Ministry of Defense signed earlier this year, the Muac is providing correlated radar and flight-plan data to the RNLAF’s Air Operations Control Station at Nieuw Milligen and seven air bases. The military controllers at Nieuw Milligen use the same system and data as their civil counterparts at the Muac, which is located at Maastricht Aachen Airport. Eurocontrol is also providing the RNLAF with equipment and training for the SAS, or shared air traffic services system, which is considered an enabling project of the Single European Sky effort.

The establishment of this remotely operated “virtual center” hosted within the Muac’s operational system “paves the way for further harmonization in air traffic management” and provides a solution for the “defragmentation” of European airspace as required by Single European Sky regulations, according to Herman Baret, Muac head of ATM strategy and development
Read more: Eurocontrol Shares Air Traffic Data with Netherlands Air Force | Aviation International News

France Air Traffic Control Goes on Strike

What's in the water in Europe? First Lufthansa pilots go on strike (briefly), then British Airways' cabin crew union voted to strike again, and now air traffic control workers in France have walked off the job.

The Associated Press reports that the strike is scheduled to last four days, and is a response to "plans to integrate European air traffic control, which workers fear will lead to losses of jobs and civil servant benefits." The unions involved are trying to "pressure President Nicolas Sarkozy's governing conservatives before next month's regional elections."

For more: France Air Traffic Control Goes on Strike

Flightglobal: ESA's satellite Air Trafic Management for European Single Sky prepares next phase - by Rob Coppinger

For the complete report from Flight Global click on this link

ESA's satellite Air Traffic Management for European Single Sky prepares next phase - by Rob Coppinger

In 2014 a small geostationary orbit satellite could be launched by the European Space Agency to help modernize air traffic management in Europe. The satellite would begin deployment of a constellation that will deliver Air Traffic Management (ATM) communications for the European Civil Aviation Conference area that spans from Iceland to Azerbaijan. By 2020 global air travel is expected to double, resulting in increasing congestion in the air and on the ground and a new requirement for an independent safety-critical air-to-ground link.