Mumbai: In the first week of May, pilots and air traffic controllers at Mumbai airport will begin an experiment, the first of its kind in India, to make aircraft land on and take off from a single runway in much quicker succession. Under a carefully choreographed sequence, even as an aircraft would enter the runway to touch down, another would be lifting off at the other end.
To keep a runway thus occupied, the controller and the pilots involved will think ahead and plan their moves down to split-second precision. Once they become confident at the game, the airport will save 20 seconds per landing. That may not sound like a lot, but then again, the airport handles about 350 landings in 24 hours and the precious seconds saved during peak hours would eventually be registered by passengers.
"The new procedure will be launched on May 5. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has instructed the procedure to be put on a trial basis for three months," said an ATC official. If successful in Mumbai, the procedure may be replicated in other congested airports like Delhi and Bangalore. While Mumbai may be the first airport to carry out the trial in India, airports like London's Heathrow and New York's JFK, and the one in Newark have been following the practice for more than a decade. In the UK, it is called 'land-after procedure'. In Mumbai, it is being called 'landing clearance based on anticipated separation'.
27/04/14 Manju V/Times of India
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To keep a runway thus occupied, the controller and the pilots involved will think ahead and plan their moves down to split-second precision. Once they become confident at the game, the airport will save 20 seconds per landing. That may not sound like a lot, but then again, the airport handles about 350 landings in 24 hours and the precious seconds saved during peak hours would eventually be registered by passengers.
"The new procedure will be launched on May 5. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has instructed the procedure to be put on a trial basis for three months," said an ATC official. If successful in Mumbai, the procedure may be replicated in other congested airports like Delhi and Bangalore. While Mumbai may be the first airport to carry out the trial in India, airports like London's Heathrow and New York's JFK, and the one in Newark have been following the practice for more than a decade. In the UK, it is called 'land-after procedure'. In Mumbai, it is being called 'landing clearance based on anticipated separation'.
27/04/14 Manju V/Times of India
