Friday 29 Mar 2024
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KUALA LUMPUR (Dec 13): The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has launched its Turbulence Aware data resource to help airlines avoid turbulence when planning routes tactically in flight.

In a statement on its website yesterday, IATA said Turbulence Aware augments an airline’s ability to forecast and avoid turbulence by pooling and sharing (in real time) turbulence data generated by participating airlines.

It said airlines currently relied upon pilot reports and weather advisories to mitigate the impact of turbulence on their operations.

IATA said these tools—while effective—have limitations due to the fragmentation of the data sources, inconsistencies in the level and quality of information available, and the locational imprecision and the subjectivity of the observations.

It said that for example, there is no standardised scale for the severity of turbulence that a pilot may report other than a light, moderate or severe scale, which becomes very subjective among different-sized aircraft and pilot experience.

IATA director general and CEO Alexandre de Juniac said Turbulence Aware is a great example of the potential for digital transformation in the airline industry.

He said the airline industry has always cooperated on safety—its number one priority.

“Big data is now turbocharging what we can achieve.

“In the case of Turbulence Aware, the more precise forecasting of turbulence will provide a real improvement for passengers, whose journeys will be even safer and more comfortable,” he said.

IATA said Turbulence Aware improves on the industry’s capabilities by collecting data from multiple contributing airlines, followed by a rigorous quality control.

It said then the data is consolidated into a single, anonymised, objective source database which is accessible to participants.

IATA said Turbulence Aware data is turned into actionable information when fed into an airline’s dispatch or airborne alerting systems.

It said the result is the first global, real-time, detailed and objective information for pilots and operations professionals to manage turbulence.

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