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Aviation History
2003
2003 - 2507.PDF
AIR TRANSPORT COVER STORY MAX KINGSLEY-JONES / LONDON KLM moves towards paperless cockpit Dutch flag carrier to carry out six-month trial of Jeppesen's Class 3 electronic flight bag on its new Boeing 777-200ERs KLM is starting a six-month trial of Jeppesen's newly certificated Class 3 electronic flight bag (EFB), ahead of a decision to move to a paperless flightdeck early next year. The Dutch airline is launch cus tomer for the device, which is fitted on its new fleet of 10 Boeing 777-200ERS - the first of which was delivered last month. Although earlier EFBs have been available for some time - the Class 1 portable PC-based unit and semi-integrated Class 2 system that uses a pen tablet computer in a crashworthy mount - Boeing says this is the first time a fully integrated Class 3 EFB has been approved for commercial service. The US Federal Aviation Administration approved the sys tem last week, and the European Joint Aviation Authorities has accepted its US counterpart's authorisation, but KLM wants to run the evaluation with paper manual back-up before moving to an all-electronic system for its per formance and aircraft operating documentation. Developed by Boeing-owned Jeppesen, the EFB transforms printed material used by pilots to operate the aircraft into digital for mat, which on the 777 is presented on liquid crystal display units adja cent to each pilot. The system requires two to four hours of com puter-based training, says Boeing. EFB customers can choose from a suite of data functions. These include navigation and airport charts, flight and operations manu als and an electronic interactive log book, a moving airport map display with taxi positional awareness (TPA) that is accurate to 3-5m (10-16ft), a performance calculator and cabin surveillance display. Although KLM has not yet taken the chart or log book functions, it has opted for the "qwerty" keyboard that is available for each pilot. Documentation is held in XML and PDF file formats. Boeing claims that the full system eliminates 35kg (771b) worth of flight manuals. Each pilot's EFB is a separate, totally independent system, says Capt William Royce, Boeing's The EFB's TPA function shows pilots their exact position on an airport map senior technical pilot training, technical and standards. "Each display unit has its own electronic unit, which gets its signals from separate GPS and flight manage ment computer sources," says Royce, adding that each electronic unit "has two computers and two separate hard drives". Linux is the main operating system with Windows as the secondary system. "The FAA has approved two-day dispatch with only one operational EFB, where there is no paper back-up on board," says Royce, adding: "We can dispatch for up to 10 days with an alternative source for crucial data." This could be in the form of a CD-ROM, from which pages could be printed out using the aircraft's onboard printer. The EFB is available as a retrofit for earlier 777s, and Boeing is working with Jeppesen to install the system on other aircraft. This could include non-Boeing types, as the system is "hardware neutral", says the manufacturer. SUPERSONIC TRANSPORT No heritage role for Concorde British Airways confirmed the end of Concorde last week, declaring that it would not be feasible to keep one aircraft flying in the heritage role. BA chief executive Rod Eddington said the feasibility study conducted with Airbus concluded that the technical and financial challenges are absolutely pro hibitive. "Airbus says it is unable to support such a project," he added. The five operational Concordes are being flown to two UK museums - Airbus UK at Filton in Bristol and Manchester airport - and three transatlantic ones: Grantley Adams airport, Bridgetown, Barbados; The Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum, New York; and the Museum of Flight, Seattle, Washington. One of the two grounded aircraft will be shipped by road and barge to the Museum of Flight, near Edinburgh, and the other is expected to go on display at Heathrow. Brooklands Museum in the UK is in talks with BAto acquire the first British production Concorde, in storage at Filton. REGULATION EC slot rules report delayed The European Commission's slot allocation reforms may run out of time after a long-awaited independent report was delayed. An initial bill to harmonise existing European slot rules has been stalled for over a year by transport ministers from smaller countries. Ministers had wanted to view the contents of an independent report, due last week but delayed until December, before passing stage one. The delay means the bill may expire, leading to a brand new proposal. ALLIANCES VLADIMIR KARNOZOV / MOSCOW Aerof lot homes in on SkyTeam membership Aeroflot Russian Airlines is "strongly expected" to join SkyTeam by the end of this year, says Yevgeny Bachurin, commer cial director of the Russian flag car rier. "No shrinking of our network will result from that, and we do not expect any dramatic increase in traffic," he adds. Aeroflot already codeshares with SkyTeam members Air France and CSA Czech Airlines, and will soon add Korean Air and Alitalia, which "will contribute to a smooth entry". Earlier last month, Aeroflot said it was also in negotiations with SkyTeam's rival Star Alliance, but the former now seems the likely winner. Speaking at the Cannes Airlines Forum last week, Air France chief executive Jean-Cyril Spinetta said that "SkyTeam would be glad to welcome Aeroflot as a partner". Over the last three years, Aeroflot has been preparing to join one of the major airline alliances by mod ernising its fleet and reorganising its route network. It now flies to 88 destinations in 48 countries. Aeroflot also plans to rebuild its alliances with other Russian carri ers. At present, it has only one lim ited codeshare with Pulkovo Airlines, but has signed agreements to codeshare with Arkhangelsk Airlines and use aircraft from the government-owned GTK Rossiya. Starting this winter, Rossiya air craft will fly to Luanda, Angola; Ulan Bator, Mongolia; and Nizhny Novgorod, Russia. www.flightinternational.com FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 4-10 NOVEMBER 2003 11
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