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COVER STORY 12 airportbusiness May 2014 Before this project, the process was totally manual, and BCADÕs visual-line-of-sight ramp control services were limited by the location of the trailer housing those monitoring the area thus restricting the size of the area being monitored, according to Scott. In fact, just 65 to 70 percent of the airfield could actually be viewed by ramp- control agents at any given time. Shull says AirIT entered talks about addressing the situation over two years ago. Fort Lauderdale officials were looking for solutions as they sat poised to lose approximately 30 percent of their airfield capacity during the phasing of its runway project. (There were to be nine separate airfield reconfigurations during construction.) Officials sought to use technology as much as possible to mitigate the negative impacts of these changes. Likewise after the project was complete, air- port officials wanted to use technology to monitor the now more complex airfield. ÒThey wanted a future-proof ramp-control system that was tech- nology based so that when they integrated the new runway into the airfield, they could manage the entire airfield more efficiently,Ó says Shull. HIGH-TECH TRACKING The solution to Fort LauderdaleÕs airfield con- cerns came through AirITÕs VAMS. ÒThe VAMS will provide video surveillance of the cov- ered areas that will be analyzed by intelligent video software integrated with FAA data to provide a single source for all ramp-control data required to safely monitor an area,Ó says Scott. VAMS consists of software that allows for dynamic, real-time tracking of aircraft. ÒThe VAMS delivers a data feed to a remote location through a camera-based system to monitor both movement and non-movement areas,Ó says Scott. One of the first steps to making this solution possible was for AirIT to work cooperatively with the FAA to capture data from its Airport Surface Detection Equipment, Model X (ASDE-X), a tool designed to detect potential runway conflicts by providing detailed coverage of movement on runways and taxiways. This system collects data from a variety of sources to track vehicles and air- craft on airfield surfaces and obtain identification from aircraft transponders. The FAA agreed to provide AirIT with a con- tinual feed of ASDE-X data, which shows all the aircraft in the movement areas and provides tag- ging data, including aircraft registration number, airline, aircraft type, flight number and so on.This feed gave the software real-time data from the movement areas. But it still left non-movement areas without coverage, and thatÕs where AirITÕs partnership with Searidge became critical. ÒASDE-X is designed to prevent runway incursions; it doesnÕt offer any sizable coverage of the non-movement area,Ó explains Shull. ÒWe partnered with Searidge Technologies to use both thermal imaging and high-definition video to cover all non-movement areas of the airfield, and we fused it seamlessly with the ASDE-X data to create one homogenous feed into the system.Ó With this technology in place, if a Southwest Airlines aircraft, for example, lands in Fort Lauderdale, within the ASDE-X feed the software can see the aircraft touch down on the runway and taxi onto a taxiway, and at the point where ASDE-X coverage goes black, Searidge technology picks up the aircraft and follows it to the gate, with all of the ASDE-X tagging data included. Later, because the system is fully integrat- ed into the airportÕs operational database and resource management system, when that aircraft picks up a new flight and gets a new flight number, all of that data will be acquired automatically. MOVE TO VIDEO TRACKING Coverage of non-movement areas comes in the form of two key components offered by Searidge, according to Fadi Ghourani, Searidge director of ATM/Airport Technology. ÒOne of them is the visual piece which is the ATC-grade video platform and the other is our IntelliDAR system,Ó he says. The ATC-grade video platform utilizes multiple video cameras and proprietary software to stitch together a panoramic view of the airfield, much like one would see when looking at the airfield from a window. ÒBut itÕs better than looking out the window because the system can zoom in digitally on any target or area of interest,Ó says Ghourani. ÒItÕs better than the human eye because you have a panoramic view that is augmented by the capability of pan-tilt zoom cameras, which can zoom in 32 times on any target even those up to a couple kilometers away.Ó The system presents gathered data to users in real time. ÒFrom the time we process the video from the sensors until we show it to the user on the display, there is a 250-millisecond system-wide latency,Ó says Ghourani. ÒItÕs definitely in real time, and thatÕs important because if youÕre providing control or advisory information in an A screenshot from AirIT's Virtual Airfield Management System. "When this project is complete, the airport will be able to manage their ramp control operations from anywhere." JEFFREY SHULL, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, AIRIT airb_10-13_CoverStory.indd 12 5/2/14 9:37 AM