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10 Aug 16. NATO begins GATM upgrade for AWACS. NATO has begun the work of making its Boeing E-3 Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft compliant with operations in commercial airspace, Airbus Defence and Space (DS) disclosed in late July. The first of 13 AWACS aircraft to go through the global air traffic management (GATM) technology insertion programme was delivered in May to Airbus DS’ Manching site in southern Germany, according to the company’s in-house journal On Air . The work on this first aircraft will be complete in March 2017, with the remaining 12 platforms all set to be delivered back to NATO by the end of 2018.
As the original equipment manufacturer (OEM), Boeing was awarded the USD250m contract to upgrade NATO’s E-3s in August 2014. As the NATO AWACS support authority, Airbus DS is carrying out the work of fitting new digital flight decks and avionics to the 13 aircraft (Boeing has already installed these systems on one NATO AWACS aircraft under an earlier engineering, manufacturing, and development [EMD] contract).
As noted in On Air, the ‘glass cockpit’ retrofit programme is focused on a new flight management system and the installation of 50 new ‘black boxes’, as well as the integration of flight safety avionic systems. As well as making the aircraft GATM-compliant, it will also reduce the flight crew from three to two. This is the sixth major upgrade of the NATO AWACS fleet that Airbus DS and its legacy companies have carried out at Manching since 1995.
Based on a modified Boeing 707/320 commercial airframe, the E-3 is built around a 9.1 m diameter rotating radome that sits atop the fuselage. This radar has a range of more than 400 km (which equates to a coverage area of more than 500,000 km 2 of airspace) to look down and detect, identify, and track low-flying aircraft over land or water. (Source: IHS Jane’s)
10 Aug 16. Blighter Surveillance Systems Ltd (www.blighter.com), a British electronic-scanning (e-scan) radar and sensor solution provider, is targeting the oil, gas and petrochemical markets with its Blighter B400 Series e-scan Doppler radar and long range thermal camera surveillance solution.
To support this move, Blighter has made some key strategic appointments. Roy Cummings, formerly at AMG Systems, joins the Blighter sales team with responsibility for critical infrastructure protection. He brings 30-years of experience in the security systems and CCTV market, most recently working with integration and consulting companies in the Gulf, notably Bahrain, Kuwait, Libya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Blighter has also appointed a Middle Eastern partner/distributor, Electroman, to focus on critical infrastructure sales in Oman. Electroman has offices at Muscat and Salalah. These strategic appointments will help the company service this important market more effectively.
Mark Radford, CEO, Blighter Surveillance Systems, said: “We are seeing growing interest in our high reliability Doppler radar and thermal imaging systems for protecting oil & gas facilities due to their effectiveness and their cost saving potential. For example, manning levels have been reduced substantially where our radar/camera systems are employed instead of fence-line/CCTV solutions.
“Furthermore, the ongoing threat of terrorism at oil and gas wells, pipelines and pumping stations, processing facilities and storage/distribution hubs, is also prompting security managers at critical infrastructure sites to consider our high reliability solution.”
According to Radford, the establishment of new mandatory in-country security levels by several oil and gas producing nations is another factor which is driving companies to assess the effectiveness of 24/7 all-weather radar/camera systems. In fact, the Blighter solution is already installed at a number of criti