GAINS’s objectives were to validate, through live flying demonstrations, concepts enabled by Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) and EGNOS. These included a Surveillance Concept proposing an electronic conspicuity (EC) solution and a Navigation Concept proposing instrument flight procedure elements incorporating advanced PBN features (e.g. RF Legs) to meet GA needs, including both fixed wing and rotorcraft.
GAINS’s Surveillance and Navigation Demonstrations aimed to show the wider aviation community how improvements being developed by SESAR can be adapted to the respective Concepts, thereby enhancing GA operations without prohibitive cost or certification requirements, enabling integration and inclusion of GA within high density airspace or environments in which GA is constrained due to proximity of adjacent airports or airways for scheduled airlines or the military.
The flights undertaken were intended to:
• Demonstrate to the wider GA community the benefits of these technologies;
• Collect evidence on performance of these technologies within the typical operational environments of GA;
• Support regulatory adaptations with the certification authorities to enable wider deployment; and
• Demonstrate the deployment of SESAR solutions to enable integration of all airspace users.
The end goal being contribution to better integration of GA at controlled and uncontrolled aerodromes, as well as improving safety, efficiency and predictability of operations and even enabling the provision of basic air traffic services at aerodromes where this is not economically viable.
Surveillance demonstrations objectives:
• the use of low-cost on-board ADS-B surveillance equipment and its use by GA/Rotorcraft for cockpit traffic situation awareness especially in the airfield circuit (the most hazardous environment).
• the use of aircraft position data transmitted by ADS-B and received on a low-cost display device at the airfield service position, to assist management of aircraft in the circuit as well as arrivals and departures from the circuit. This will be demonstrated for three service environments: Air-Ground Communication Service; Aerodrome Flight Information Service and, subject to availability, Air Traffic Control Service.
• the effective reception range of ADS-B equipment with both fixed transmission power and variable/adaptive power in two environments: airfield circuit and in class G airspace outside the aerodrome air traffic zone.
Navigation demonstrations objectives:
• that a range of GA aircraft/rotorcraft with a range of different equipment capabilities are able to participate safely and efficiently in the navigation solutions envisaged, in particular the ability to fly RF legs with acceptable flight technical error.
• potential operational advantages of these solutions in constrained operational environments, for example, short final approach segments, steeper than standard glidepaths, and avoidance of noise sensitive areas
• that, in combination with the surveillance solutions, these navigation solutions can be integrated into a typical GA airfield operating environment with limited ATM capability.
