ADaaS project between Slovenia Control and EUROCONTROL

Shadow operations of live air traffic under the responsibility of Ljubljana Area Control Centre have successfully been conducted at Slovenia Control, using the remote data provided by the operational ATM system at EUROCONTROL’s Maastricht Upper Area Control Centre (MUAC). These shadow operations are part of the ‘ATM Data as a Service’ (ADaaS) project and are an essential step towards the concept of data centres developed in support of the Single European Sky.

Co-financed by the European Union’s Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) to the tune of € 2.45 million, the three-year ADaaS project between Slovenia Control and MUAC aims at contributing to the Single European Sky by deploying new technologies and best practices. With the successful completion of these shadow operations, representing Phase 1 of the ADaaS Demonstrator, expert teams from both air navigation service providers were able to overcome, in a limited time-period, the operational and technical challenges inherent to such an innovative approach in the ATM environment.

The ADaaS Demonstrator uses local radars, tracking and safety net services, but is fed by remote Flight Data Processing System services from MUAC. In addition, the MUAC controller working positions/human-machine interface have been deployed within Slovenia Control.

The successful shadow operations pave the way for Phase 2 of the ADaaS Demonstrator, to be validated in the first quarter of 2017, which aims to demonstrate the use of an open interface between the MUAC Flight Data Processing System and the Slovenia Control controller working positions/human-machine interface.

The final architecture of the demonstration (Phase 3 of the ADaaS Demonstrator) will contain a distributed Flight Data Processing System in two locations (MUAC and Slovenia Control) and can serve controller working positions/human-machine interfaces either remotely or locally. It is planned for the third quarter of 2017. Phase 3 will provide essential data on how to deploy a state-of-the-art data centre from which an ATM Data Service Provider (ADSP) can deliver services to Air Traffic Service Units (ATSUs) with proper contingency and disaster recovery.