Method to operate a system of categorization/degradation of operating procedures for low visibility (LVP) of an airport runway
A method to operate a system in support of air traffic control of an airport provides, automatically, to operators, in the same screen, status information for the systems required during low visibility operation, meteorological information and runway category of operation, making easier the operation of the controller and increasing airport security. The method comprises monitoring the status of all low visibility operation systems, calculation of a category more convenient for the operation of the airport runway, and degradation automatic (down grade) when it degrades a key system and upgrade or downgrade manually the category by operator decision. The method includes an architecture oriented for high availability with three blocks (Management, Input/Output and Visualization) and uses an application “alive” that performs automatic switching between servers, in case of failure or malfunction of one of them, increasing the availability of the system.
1. A method for operating a categorization/degradation system of operating procedures for low visibility (LVP) of an airport runway, comprising the steps of:
monitoring a status of all systems related to low visibility operations;
presenting the status of all systems related to low visibility operations on a single screen;
defining a category to the operation of the airport runway appropriate to weather conditions of the airport runway and all systems related to low visibility operations;
automatically lowering the category of operation of the airport runway upon the detection of a degradation in a system essential to the operation of the airport runway in that category;
manually increasing the category of operation of the airport runway, if weather conditions require, in response to an operator raising to a new category of operation subject to the status of the systems allowing said raise;
manually lowering the category of operation of the airport runway, if weather conditions permit in response to the operator descending to the new category of operation; and
switching between servers upon detection of a failure of one of the servers.
2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of presenting the status of all systems related to low visibility operations includes using terminals located in an airport control tower and terminals located at other sites, and further includes providing technical information to technical support operations in the airport terminal.
3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of defining a category to the operation of the airport runway is based on calculations using the status information collected from all systems that support the low visibility operation, combined with a set of limit parameters of the categories of operation.
4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the steps of automatically lowering, manually increasing, and manually decreasing the category of operation of the airport runway includes the steps of analyzing in real time the systems necessary for low visibility operation of the airport, combining the obtained information with weather conditions information, and defining the category appropriate to the operation on the airport runway.
5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of switching between servers is performed manually or automatically, with the manual switching being carried out by an operator, and the automatic switching occurring when a first server in a MASTER state operation crashes and the system switches to a second server in a SLAVE state operation, and further including the step of changing the second server to the MASTER state operation.
6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising using an architecture based on a management block, an input/output block, and a visualization block that define the LVP system, a main server, tower termins, and terminals located at other sites.