KIWI Electronics Firm Lands Oz Defence Contract

KIWI Electronics Firm Lands Australian Defence Contract

NEW ZEALAND company Radiola Corporation is to supply the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) with the world’s first transportable instrument landing system.

“The driver for the recently signed $5.5 million contract and three year support package was the need to provide safe and effective control of aircraft landing in poor weather at remote unserviced airfields in East Timor,” said Radiola Defence and Aerospace Manager Richard Thompson.

He said that at the start of the East Timor operation the RAAF identified a deficiency in its Air Traffic Control capability: “They did not have equipment that could be deployed and quickly set up to help pilots landing at airfields with no effective approach and landing aids.

“This is because traditional Instrument Landing Systems are fixed installations that cannot be set up without extensive civil works – such as concrete pads, cable trenching and power feeds – being carried out first.

“What we are doing is to take the very latest Transponder Landing System (TLS) and mount it in a vehicle that is air transportable. In this form it becomes a Transportable Transponder Landing System (TTLS). As prime contractor, Radiola is working with US technology company Advanced Navigation and Positioning Corporation and Australian firm GH Varley Pty Ltd.

“The system uses existing aircraft avionics and communication equipment to provide either ILS-like guidance signals or precision approach radar/ground controlled approach (PAR/GCA) guidance commands. In effect it is a hybrid ILS/PAR system.

“It interrogates the aircraft’s transponder and computes the position of the aircraft continually, providing the relevant steering commands to the pilot via standard Instrument Landing System (ILS) frequencies”, said Mr Thompson.

The system meets ICAO standards and interfaces with standard on-board avionics. Virtually no additional pilot training is required.

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