SITTI AND SESAR VIRTUAL CENTRE EXERCISES
On November 11, 2022, ENAV (the Italian ANSP) (Air Navigation Service Provider) organized an Open Day for celebrating the conclusion of the campaign aimed at validating the Virtual Centre Architectures in the frame of SESAR 2020 W2.
The execution of the various exercises validated the concept of “Delegation of ATM services provision among ATSUs”, together with contingency use cases. For the purpose of the campaign, one ADSP (ATM Data Service Provider) and two ATSUs (ATM Service Units) were involved in a simulated environment, focusing on the coordination between Rome and Brindisi ACCs (Area Control Centres), also including Civil-Military operations.
The exercises were carried out at ENAV National Test Facility in Rome using COFLIGHT Cloud Services (CCS), LEONARDO radar stations and SITTI Voice Communication System (VCS) touchscreens, taking into due consideration the specific requirements to support the service interfaces with the Virtual Centre architectures defined by EUROCAE Working Group 122.
SITTI actively contributed to the success of the planned exercises through a simulated VCS environment. The VCS facility make it possible to ATCOs (air traffic control operators) working at the (simulated) site of Brindisi to interact with their colleagues in Rome and some (simulated) pilots to run all foreseen tests and positively terminate the validation campaign. The following operational use cases have been addressed from an operational perspective at different traffic load conditions:
- Delegation of ATM services provision at night
- Delegation of ATM services provision at fixed time
- Delegation of ATM services provision on-demand
- Delegation of ATM services provision between Civil and Military ATSUs
The SITTI system showed its native flexibility, by allowing the definition of many different independent operational scenarios, through which all communication aspects involved in the delegation process could be successfully assessed.
