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Home | Update | Latest Issue | Gallery | FR Profile | Datafiles | FR 11/96 ALLIEDSIGNAL EGPWS: MORE SAFETY WITH TERRAIN DATABASE by Karl Schwarz AlliedSignal's new Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System (EGPWS) is due for FAA certification any day now. According to the manufacturer, the new system eliminates the technical limitations of today's GPWS technology which is just measuring the height above the terrain and is not able to give a warning ahead of the aircraft's flight path. The trick is - similar to a technology that has been already tested in military aviation - the use of a digital database which contains the terrain elevation of all areas of the world. Based on the aircraft position and altitude data, which are retrieved from the existing on-board navigation systems (for example GPS), the EGPWS is able to inform the crew about the aircraft's relative position to the surrounding terrain. The information is displayed on the navigation display or on the display of the weather radar. Safe terrain (500 ft/150 m underneath the aircraft) is displayed in green, higher elevations are displayed in yellow or red (2000 ft/610 m above the present flight altitude). According to AlliedSignal, this allows warnings, such as "caution terrain", already one minute ahead of the danger. 30 seconds before an imminent crash, which is much earlier than today's systems, the EGPWS can warn the crew with the usual "terrain, terrain, pull up, pull up" call. American Airlines is the first airline which has started to integrate the new system into its entire fleet. All 635 aircraft will supposedly be configured with the new EGPWS until mid-1999. The update program has a volume of $ 20 million. Alaska Airlines has ordered the system as well. Furthermore, AlliedSignal stated that most major airlines are interested in EGPWS. The price of the system will supposedly not be a hindering factor due to acknowledged better performance of the system. AlliedSignal quotes a price of 56000 dollars, which is approximately 15 percent above a conventional GPWS. From page 62 of FLUG REVUE 11/96 Home | Update | Latest Issue | Gallery | FR Profile | Datafiles | FR 11/96 Copyright 1996 by Motor-Presse Stuttgart. All rights reserved. Last updated October 20, 1996