Indra, a leading global technological engineering company for the aerospace, defence and mobility sectors, has developed a pioneering project for Lisbon Airport, run by ANA (VINCI Airports), which will provide the Portuguese airport with an unprecedented degree of integration with Eurocontrol by incorporating the Airport Operations Plan (AOP) into the European air navigation Network Operations Plan (NOP).
Indra’s solution will facilitate greater flight visibility and predictability, providing the airport and all of its stakeholders with the very best framework for action based on common situational awareness and the early detection of schedule deviations, thus minimizing potential delays, costs and associated emissions.
This will be possible because, for the first time, Indra’s AOP system implemented at Lisbon airport will exchange information on flight arrivals with the Network Manager Operations Center of the European air navigation network manager and anticipate the sending of information on departures as soon as the airlines issue their flight plans, which may occur about 20 hours before departure, compared with the three hours in advance with which the most advanced airports (CDM-Collaborative Decision Making) provide this information.
Lisbon Airport will thus initiate a new level of AOP-NOP airports, increasing the accuracy of the data and anticipating the knowledge of the situation at the airport on the part of Eurocontrol, which will not only obtain information on the flight plans, in other words, the aircraft once they’re in the air, but the whole process, including what happens at the airport.
The LIS-IAOP project developed by Indra for Lisbon Airport, run by ANA (VINCI Airports), has been funded by the European Union through CINEA, the European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency.
It constitutes an initial milestone in ensuring greater visibility and predictability for flights across the European air traffic network and enhancing air traffic coordination, management and capacity on the continent.
The more airports that exchange this level of flight departure and arrival information and become AOP-NOP, the greater the visibility of what’s happening throughout Europe and the better it can be managed.
The top 30 European airports will therefore have to have this level of integration in place by 2027, as mandated by the European Commission (Regulation no. 2021/116), as a result of which they’ll have to carry out similar projects, also with the support of the European CINEA agency.
“This project for Lisbon Airport has been made possible by Indra’s previous experience at SESAR, where it has been able to work, test and validate several developments that have contributed to making our Airport Operations Plan product the most advanced of its kind currently in operation”, emphasized Lidia Muñoz Perez, Indra’s Director of Ports and Airports in the Mobility Market.
“Being a spearhead in this area of cooperation between airport management and air traffic management in Europe will reinforce Indra’s technological leadership and position the company with a view to future contracts at other European airports.”
