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March 2001 Meeting Report |
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The March 8, 2001 meeting of the Alaska Computer Society was held at the Anchorage Museum of History and Art starting at 7:07 pm. President Gene White was off to Australia and New Zealand to get away from it all so Dawn Scott hosted the meeting. Dawn lead off with a review of the Alaska Computer Society activities and introduced the members of the board present. Questions & Answers One person asked, "Has anyone tried the AT&T broadband system yet?". So far no one in the group seems to be using the new service. It is not available in all areas of the community yet. See www.IATT.net/local/ak/local_services.html for more info Main Meeting We are in the process of locating a new site for our meetings as a result of increased costs and availability problems. We welcome any suggestions for locations that would offer suitable accommodations to our needs. Dawn announced special events coming up. There will be an E-commerce session put on by the Chamber of Commerce on March 28th. The cost for ACS members is $70.00. Check the Chamber's website at www.AnchorageChamber.org for details. The Association of Information Technology Professions (AITP) Infocom 2001 conference and technology show will be May 23 and 24th at the Egan Center. Check their site at www.AITP-AK.org for details. The April 12th ACS meeting will be a presentation by Microsoft of an array of their most popular programs. It will be at the Museum. Howard Bonar reported on the software evaluation program - we still have a few items available. He also reported on the AARP Information Center and the Anchorage Senior Center's computer training classes. Volunteer instructors are needed at both locations. If you have some spare time and would like to participate in a very worthwhile and satisfying activity, contact Howard for more information. Dawn reported that ACS is working on improving its publicity coverage. She asked the question "How did you learn about our meeting?". Several heard the announcement on NPR (National Public Radio) and several saw the notice in the paper. Sharon Duncan brought back several more T-shirts from the Comdex show in Las Vegas and these were passed out in the drawing. We had several winners. The Presentation CAPSTONE AVIATION COCKPIT SYSTEM Mr. Elmer Webster from the Anchorage office of the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) Capstone Program introduced us to the government's latest investment in aviation safety. He brought two Capstone systems to demonstrate for us this remarkable new aircraft navigation, communication, and collision avoidance system. Dennis Gerstung, Capstone Systems Engineer, assisted in demonstrating the units. WHAT IT'S ALL ABOUT In Alaska, one in every fifty-eight people is a licensed pilot and there are six airplanes for every ten pilots. With our lack of roads, we are highly dependent on air travel for access to the remote communities. More people per capita are flying much more than they do elsewhere. In Alaska we have averaged one accident every other day for ten years. On the average, there is one fatality every nine days. Sadly, 11% of the Alaska pilots perish in planes. This happens at a rate 2½ times the national average. Our accident rate is significantly higher than other areas because of the harsh weather conditions and the hostile environment. Alaska has approximately 10% of the nations commercial air carriers, which generates about 35% of the nations commercial operator accidents. Lack of complete coverage of the state with radar and flight control adds to the dangers. A study of the radar coverage of the state has shown that adding additional sites will offer only marginal improvement in the accident rate since so much of the state would still be in the shadow of mountains. Over the past ten years, a lot of effort and money has been spent developing new procedures and technologies that will help to reduce the accident toll. With the development of better, faster, and cheaper computers it is now possible to bring together several technologies that provide the pilot with crucial information needed to safely fly in this hostile environment. PHASE ONE: BETHEL The Yukon - Kuskokwim Delta region transportation hub is Bethel. It is served by approximately 25 % of the commercial aircraft in Alaska and has a proportionate number of air travel accidents. It also endures far more than its share of flying weather problems. It was chosen for the demonstration program, as it should provide a large enough sample size to develop meaningful statistics on the benefits of the system. Most of the commercial aircraft based in the test area will be equipped, on a voluntary basis, with the government-furnished equipment. Some other commercial and government aircraft regularly operating in the test area will also be equipped. THE INFRASTRUCTURE The airborne avionics are complemented by a ground-based infrastructure providing weather reports, data link communications, radar surveillance, and flight information services. The data link network will be installed within existing FAA and joint-use facilities at up to twelve locations in the Bethel test area and connected via existing communications systems to FAA air traffic control facilities. New non-precision GPS instrument approach procedures will be prepared for ten of the remote village airports within the Bethel test area. The air carrier industry and the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF) jointly selected these high priority airports. If the budget permits, automated weather observation systems will be installed at some of these airports to enable pilots to use the new GPS instrument approach procedures. ON BOARD THE AIRCRAFT The system is a computer based integrated package including several modules and elements: A built in IFR-certified (Instrument Flight Rule) GPS (Global Positioning System) navigation receiver which continuously displays the location of the airplane. This information is compared to the contour map data and any nearby terrain that would be a hazard to the flight. The data readout is displayed in red for faster recognition. There is a 50-watt UHF radio transmitter operating in the 981 MHz band for the data link to the ground stations and other aircraft in the vicinity. Radio communication is Air-to-Air and Point-to-Point. It is line of sight transmission that means the receiving antenna must be able to see the transmitting antenna for dependable communications. There is also a color video monitor, which displays the location of the airplane on a contour map of the area below. Any nearby aircraft and its location, altitude, direction of flight, and a rating of the risk it presents are also displayed. The display is color coded with the different levels of risk. Red means you are on a collision course and need to take immediate evasive action. All of the standard IFR Airport information is loaded into the computer - it is no longer necessary to have on board the several volumes needed to hold all of this information. The data is loaded into a memory module that can be upgraded every month or two depending on the rate of changes. Weather information, both text and graphics, are displayed when needed. Winds, wind shear, visibility, and ceiling information are available on demand. The latest topographic maps of Alaska are loaded into the computer and are an important part of the informational display. They are stored in an easily replaceable memory module. As area maps are upgraded, the new information will be loaded in. THE STATUS Capstone now has 86 units installed in the Bethel area with a total of 150 planned. Since the inception of the program, there has been only one accident involving a Capstone equipped plane. The pilot landed about fifty feet short of the runway and damaged his landing gear. PHASE TWO: SOUTH EAST ALASKA The program has already been so successful that an additional $5 million has been awarded for expansion into Southeast Alaska. That program is expected to go forward rapidly because of the good results already shown in the Bethel area. SO WHAT DOES IT COST For this test program cost of each unit is $15-20 thousand dollars. Once the design is finalized and units become available for purchase by individuals, the cost should be much less than that. Because of the stringent testing and certification requirements, equipment used in commercial aircraft is much more expensive than home devices. If you are interested in learning more about this system, FAA has the whole story available on line at www.Alaska.FAA.gov/capstone . |
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