Skyguide (Swiss Air Navigation Services Ltd.) is an air navigation service provider which manages and monitors Swiss airspace. The company, which was formerly known as Swisscontrol, changed its name to Skyguide in 2001. Skyguide is a joint-stock company under Swiss private law which is responsible, on behalf of the Swiss Confederation, for ensuring the safety of all Swiss airspace and of adjoining airspace areas in Germany, Austria, France and Italy that have been delegated to its control. For Swiss airspace, this duty extends to both civil and military air navigation services.
Skyguide is subject to the supervisory authority of the Swiss Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications (DETEC). Its principal shareholder is the Swiss Confederation, which holds 99.91% of its share capital. The company employs some 1,500 people, around two-thirds of them in the provision of air navigation services, a quarter in technical services and the rest mainly in administration. Alex Bristol, the current CEO, assumed his duties on 1 July 2017.[1] Skyguide is headquartered in Meyrin, near Geneva Airport.[2]
Skyguide in figures
Skyguide managed some 1,198,663 instrument flight rules (IFR) flights through its airspace in 2016 – an average of around 3,285 flights a day – and generated total annual operating revenue of over CHF 455 million. Switzerland's air navigation service provider currently employs some 1,500 personnel spread over 14 locations throughout the country. Two-thirds of them are in air navigation services, around a quarter are in technical functions, and most of the rest hold administrative positions.[3]
Military tasks
Skyguide's most important partners are the Swiss Air Force. Switzerland's air policing and defence are the responsibility of the Swiss Air Force, which, with its primary radars, can also detect flying objects not emitting a transponder signal. Skyguide is unusual, however, in that in addition to its civil air traffic management role, the company also provides Switzerland's military air navigation services.[4]
Skyguide's military controllers have all completed their basic civil air traffic controller training. In addition, these controllers will also have had additional training for military airport operations or in tactical fighter control. Normally, they work as civilian employees alongside military personnel; but if required (e.g. for the annual World Economic Forum in Davos), they will perform duties within the military operation.
Skyguide manages Swiss airspace dynamically together with the Swiss Air Force according to current military or civil needs. In some cases, skyguide's military controllers may also guide fighters in the so-called "cross-border areas" in France or Italy. So military airspace may also extend beyond national borders and be used by the air forces of the two countries concerned.
Innovation
Stripless: Since 2015, skyguide has adopted a harmonized stripless system at both its control centres (en-route & lower airspace sectors). The benefits here include increased heads-up time, shorter and safe handovers as well as providing voice traffic with additional digital support.
Virtual Centre: In consolidating its air traffic control centres virtually (instead of physically, with all the latter's political, social and economic ramifications), skyguide is generating a new paradigm in air navigation services. The Virtual Centre model promises substantial benefits in terms of operational flexibility, business continuity and cost-effective technical evolution.[5]
Satellite-based navigation: The potential for further developing conventional navigation systems based on expensive terrestrial equipment is reaching its limits. So if flight procedures are to be further refined, new technologies are required. One such technology is satellite-based navigation, which offers more possibilities than conventional navigation systems and provides a promising foundation for innovative new approaches and departure procedures. One of the key advantages of this new technology is the greater positional accuracy it provides. This, in turn, offers several further benefits, with the promise of more efficient air traffic handling, lower fuel consumption, fewer pollutant emissions and less noise, too.[6]
Solar Impulse: Skyguide actively supported the pioneering Solar Impulse venture in its round-the-world flight, providing air traffic services during test flights, aeronautical publications and a 24/7 help-desk throughout both the voyage and the years leading up to it. Skyguide shares Solar Impulse's passion for a more sustainable aviation industry and is proud to have served as a facilitator here.[7]
Locations
Skyguide HQ GenevaSkyguide Air Traffic Control Center &Air Force HQ at Wangen
Skyguide's main operating locations are its two operations centres, one next to Dübendorf Air Force Base in Wangen-Brüttisellen (near Zurich) and the other near Geneva Airport at Meyrin. The latter is also home to the company's administrative head office. The Wangen centre came into operation in February 2009. The centre is responsible for the airspace above German-speaking Switzerland, Lichtenstein, Western Austria and parts of Southern Germany. It is also home to the company's Aeronautical Information Services and to the Skyguide Training Center, which has two tower simulators and further facilities for the real-time training of air traffic controllers and other air navigation services personnel for both skyguide and foreign air navigation service providers. The premises also accommodate the peacetime operations centre and air surveillance center of the Swiss Air Force.
Skyguide's Geneva centre is responsible for Western Swiss airspace, the airspace above the French Alps and part of Italian airspace on the border with France.
Skyguide maintains further operations at Bern (Belp), Buochs, Grenchen, Lugano (Agno) and St. Gallen-Altenrhein regional airports and at numerous all-military or joint civil/military airfields. These include Alpnach, Dübendorf, Emmen, Locarno, Meiringen, Payerne and Sion. At Les Eplatures regional airport, the air traffic services have been delegated to the airport operator.
Skyguide uses nine radar stations for civil air traffic control:[8]
Two own wide-ranging secondary radar stations also referred to as «en route»- radar stations, with locations above the Zurich community Boppelsen on the Jura hillside Lägern and on the La Dôle
Two own combined primary and secondary radar, also referred to as «Approach» radar stations, at the airports of Geneva (in Cointrin) and Zurich (on the Klotener Holberg) for landing and take-off guidance.
Four foreign radar stations to complete the national radar coverage in Switzerland and to provide air traffic to neighboring air traffic controllers with locations in Cirfontaine and Nevers (France), Gosheim (Germany) and Monte Lesima (Italy).
Europe's airspace is highly fragmented today. The Single European Sky (SES) project of the European Commission is intended to harmonize the continent's air traffic management systems and, in doing so, enhance the efficiency of the overall airspace structure. And one prerequisite for this – in addition to tailoring airways more closely to users' requirements rather than basing them on national borders – is the creation of a series of large integrated airspace blocks.
Skyguide is a member of Functional Airspace Block Europe Central (FABEC),[9] which controls some 55% of all the air traffic handled in Europe, or around 5.3 million flights a year. The six FABEC member states – Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Switzerland – signed the corresponding international agreement in December 2010, laying the legal foundation for the new airspace entity.
Skyguide's main contribution to the defragmentation of European airspace, however, is its concept to consolidate existing air navigation centres into a virtual entity (the "Virtual Centre").
Skyguide traces its origins back to 1922, when, after the First World War had demonstrated the importance of telecommunications, Switzerland concluded an agreement with the Marconi company. Swiss subsidiary Marconi Radio AG was founded on 23 February of that year to develop wireless telegraphy. On 10 May 1928, the company name was changed to Radio Schweiz AG (RSAG) to emphasize its Swiss national character. And on 1 January 1931, the Swiss Confederation mandated Radio Schweiz to provide air navigation services in Switzerland.[10][11]
Up until the end of the Second World War, Radio Schweiz was primarily engaged in meeting the telegraphic communications needs of the Swiss Confederation. Only on 21 December 1948, after concluding an agreement under which the Confederation and the country's airports would bear the costs of air navigation services, did Radio Schweiz start to monitor Swiss airspace.[11]
On 1 January 1989, Radio Schweiz's air navigation activities were restructured and brought into the new Swisscontrol company, whose headquarters were in Bern. Swisscontrol was converted into a public limited company in 1996, and its headquarters were transferred from Bern to Geneva.
At the beginning of 2001, military air navigation services, which had been provided separately until then, were also placed under the responsibility of Swisscontrol, which was renamed skyguide in the process. Skyguide thus became the first air navigation service provider in Europe to control the whole of its country's airspace.
On 1 July 2002, a Tupolev Tu-154 of BAL Bashkirian Airlines of the Republic of Bashkortostan in Russia and a Boeing 757 of DHL Expresscollided in Überlingen near the German-Swiss border at an altitude of 12,000 metres in skyguide-controlled Southern German airspace. 71 people died.[12] Four skyguide employees were subsequently sentenced by a court. On 24 February 2004, Peter Nielsen, the air traffic controller who had been on duty at the time, was stabbed to death by Vitaly Kaloyev, who had lost his wife and two children in the accident.[13]
On 21 September 2005, skyguide became one of Europe's first air navigation service providers to be certificated companywide to the ISO 9001:2000 norm. In achieving this, skyguide also met the requirement for Single European Sky (SES) certification.[14]
On 15 March 2006, skyguide was adjudged to have not met the requirements for operating a single control centre for Switzerland's upper airspace. The project concerned did, however, allow the management of Geneva's upper airspace to be gradually made 'stripless' from 2005 onwards. Skyguide has since been pursuing the strategy of merging its two en-route centres into one virtual entity (the Virtual Centre).
At the beginning of 2010, six states (including Switzerland) signed an international agreement legally establishing Functional Airspace Block Europe Central (FABEC) as part of Europe's endeavours to create a Single European Sky.
On 29 August 2016, an F/A-18C of the Fliegerstaffel 17 crashed in the Susten Pass in central Switzerland during a training mission. The pilot was found dead.[16] As a cause, an incorrect altitude instruction of the Skyguide Controller in Tower Meiringen is assumed.
The Single European Sky (SES) is a European Commission initiative that seeks to reform the European air traffic management system through a series of actions carried out in four different levels with the aim of satisfying the needs of the European airspace in terms of capacity, safety, efficiency and environmental impact.
Air traffic control (ATC) is a service provided by ground-based air traffic controllers who direct aircraft on the ground and through a given section of controlled airspace, and can provide advisory services to aircraft in non-controlled airspace. The primary purpose of ATC is to prevent collisions, organize and expedite the flow of traffic in the air, and provide information and other support for pilots.
NATS Holdings, formally National Air Traffic Services and commonly referred to as NATS, provides en-route air traffic control services to flights within the UK flight information regions and the Shanwick Oceanic Control Area. It also provides air traffic control services to 14 UK airports.
The Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) is a commercial semi-state company in Ireland responsible for the regulation of safety aspects of air travel. Its head office is in The Times Building in Dublin.
Shanwick is the air traffic control (ATC) name given to the area of international airspace which lies above the northeast part of the Atlantic Ocean.
The Swiss Air Force is the air component of the Swiss Armed Forces, established on 31 July 1914, three days after the outbreak of World War I, as a part of the army and in October 1936 as an independent service.
ENAIRE is the air navigation manager in Spain, certified for the provision of enroute, approach and aerodrome control services. As a public corporate entity attached to the Spanish Ministry of Public Works, it is responsible for air traffic control, aeronautical information and the communication, navigation and surveillance networks so air companies and their aircraft can fly safely and in an organised format within Spanish airspace.
The European Organisation for the Safety of Air Navigation, commonly known as Eurocontrol, is an international organisation working to achieve safe and seamless air traffic management across Europe. Founded in 1963, Eurocontrol currently has 42 member states with headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. It has several local sites as well, including an Innovation Hub in Brétigny-sur-Orge, France, the Aviation Learning Centre (ALC) in Luxembourg, and the Maastricht Upper Area Control Centre (MUAC) in Maastricht, the Netherlands. The organisation employs approximately two thousand people, and operates with an annual budget in excess of half a billion euros.
Royal Air Force Prestwick or simply known as RAF Prestwick, is a former Royal Air Force station based at the NATS air traffic control centre, adjacent to Glasgow Prestwick Airport, South Ayrshire, in south west Scotland. The unit was home to the Scottish Air Traffic Control Centre (Military) which provided an air traffic control service to military aircraft operating within its area of responsibility. Prestwick was also home to a Distress and Diversion (D&D) Cell which provided assistance to both military and civil aircraft in an emergency.
Airservices Australia is an Australian Government-owned corporation, responsible for providing services to the aviation industry within the Australian Flight Information Region (FIR). Some of Airservices Australia’s responsibilities include air traffic control, airway navigation, communication facilities, publishing aeronautical data, airport rescue, and fire-fighting services. Airservices Australia has international partnerships with ICAO, CANSO and IATA.
In air traffic control, an area control center (ACC), also known as a center or en-route center, is a facility responsible for controlling aircraft flying in the airspace of a given flight information region (FIR) at high altitudes between airport approaches and departures. In the US, such a center is referred to as an air route traffic control center (ARTCC).
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The Australian Advanced Air Traffic System (TAAATS), is the hardware and software system used by Airservices Australia for air traffic control services. It is a paperless, computer-based system, which serves as an aid to civilian air traffic controllers. It does not control aircraft, but gives the user a display of information about an aircraft's position and associated information. It also handles communications and other information exchanges.
Airways New Zealand is the sole Air Traffic Service provider in New Zealand.
The National Airspace System (NAS) is the airspace, navigation facilities and airports of the United States along with their associated information, services, rules, regulations, policies, procedures, personnel and equipment. It includes components shared jointly with the military. It is one of the most complex aviation systems in the world, and services air travel in the United States and over large portions of the world's oceans.
Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast (ADS-B) is an aviation surveillance technology and form of electronic conspicuity in which an aircraft determines its position via satellite navigation or other sensors and periodically broadcasts its position and other related data, enabling it to be tracked. The information can be received by air traffic control ground-based or satellite-based receivers as a replacement for secondary surveillance radar (SSR). Unlike SSR, ADS-B does not require an interrogation signal from the ground or from other aircraft to activate its transmissions. ADS-B can also receive point-to-point by other nearby equipped ADS-B equipped aircraft to provide traffic situational awareness and support self-separation.
Remote and virtual tower (RVT) is a modern concept where the air traffic service (ATS) at an airport is performed somewhere other than in the local control tower. Although it was initially developed for airports with low traffic levels, in 2021 it was implemented at a major international airport, London City Airport.
The direction des Services de la navigation aérienne (DSNA) is the agency in charge of air traffic control, communication and information for France. It is a part of the Ministry of Sustainable Development and was created by decree in February 2005. The DSNA works in close coordination with its military counterpart, DIRCAM and since 2011 military controllers and civil controllers are being integrated into the same control centers using the same systems. DSNA is integrated into the Central European Functional Airspace Block (FABEC). Maurice Georges is the Director of Air Navigation Services (DSNA) since July 2009. DSNA Headquarters is in Paris.
Skeyes, formerly called Belgocontrol or in its complete form the Authority of airways, is the Belgian air navigation and traffic service provider for the civil airspace for which the Belgian State is responsible. It was created in 1998.
Lahore Area Control Centre is one of three Area Control Centers in Pakistan operated by the Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority and based at Allama Iqbal International Airport in Lahore. Lahore ACC air traffic controllers provide en route and terminal control services to aircraft in the Lahore Flight Information Region (FIR). The Lahore FIR airspace covers Pakistani airspace between the 30° North to 37° North. To the south is the Karachi FIR. To the north is the Urumqi FIR. To the east is the Delhi FIR. To the west is the Kabul FIR.
↑ Sandro., Fehr (1 January 2014). Die Erschliessung der dritten Dimension Entstehung und Entwicklung der zivilen Luftfahrtinfrastruktur in der Schweiz, 1919-1990. Chronos. ISBN9783034012287. OCLC867875915.
↑ Annual Report 2006. skyguide. 2006. p.7. Skyguide was awarded Single European Sky (SES) certification by the Swiss Federal Office of Civil Aviation (FOCA) at the end of December 2006, confirming the compliance of our safety management with all European requirements. We were delighted to secure this: we have been steadily developing our safety management system for some years now, working consistently towards this certification goal in 2006 and have thus achieved a key strategic objective.
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