Required navigation performance (RNP) - the future of airport approach and departure systems - has finally come to Europe.
It would be unfair to Atlantic Airways and the Faroe Islands to say that RNP has entered Europe by the back door, but they will understand the point. The Faroes' airport at Vagar cannot be served by any other kind of all-weather approach aid because terrain at both ends of the runway makes straight approaches impossible. For the same reason, a decade ago Alaska Airlines and the US Federal Aviation Administration began installing just such approaches in Alaskan valley-based airports. It has been a massive success there. New Zealand has acted in the same way as the USA - setting up RNP approaches where nothing else would work.
Alaska was America's back door, but since then Southwest Airlines has been championing the widespread introduction of GPS-based precision area navigation (PRNAV) approaches and departures even where they are not the only way, simply because RNP approaches and departures save time and fuel, and limit noise and pollution.
China has used RNP widely for years, admittedly starting at its more challenging airports. But China has the advantage of working from a blank canvas. Europe's canvas is far from blank, but is it too much to hope that it might start thinking laterally? Probably.
(This first appeared as the lead Comment article in Flight International 3 April)
It would be unfair to Atlantic Airways and the Faroe Islands to say that RNP has entered Europe by the back door, but they will understand the point. The Faroes' airport at Vagar cannot be served by any other kind of all-weather approach aid because terrain at both ends of the runway makes straight approaches impossible. For the same reason, a decade ago Alaska Airlines and the US Federal Aviation Administration began installing just such approaches in Alaskan valley-based airports. It has been a massive success there. New Zealand has acted in the same way as the USA - setting up RNP approaches where nothing else would work.
Alaska was America's back door, but since then Southwest Airlines has been championing the widespread introduction of GPS-based precision area navigation (PRNAV) approaches and departures even where they are not the only way, simply because RNP approaches and departures save time and fuel, and limit noise and pollution.
China has used RNP widely for years, admittedly starting at its more challenging airports. But China has the advantage of working from a blank canvas. Europe's canvas is far from blank, but is it too much to hope that it might start thinking laterally? Probably.
(This first appeared as the lead Comment article in Flight International 3 April)
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