European regional cargo carrier West Atlantic expects to receive European certification for an extensive cockpit upgrade for its fleet of 43 BAe ATP freighters within three months.

The retrofit includes a five-panel integrated avionics system built by Universal Avionics. Systems integrator Scandinavian Avionics completed the first flight of the upgrade on a prototype aircraft in March.

New equipment includes Universal's EFI-890R electronic flight instrument system, a new Universal flight management system, a terrain awareness and warning system and the company's Vision-1 synthetic vision system. The upgrade will also include a digital engine interface unit built by Ametek and a new turbulence-capable weather radar.

ATP-Cockpit universal-Avion 
 © Universal Avionics

Future upgrades will include required navigation performance capability and satellite-based augmentation to boost the precision of GPS and other satellite-based navigation systems, says Universal.

Source: Flight International