Southwest Airlines is spending USD$175 million to fit its fleet with advanced navigation equipment aimed at saving time and fuel -- an effort stalled at some rivals over money and frustration with US regulators.
The initiative overseen by the Federal Aviation Administration aims to marry new cockpit displays with satellite-based global positioning system (GPS) technology, giving pilots more efficient airport approaches.
The current jet routes, navigated using radio navigation devices and radar, are less precise, less flexible and can cost carriers millions of dollars in wasted fuel.
The GPS-based program is the signature effort in the drive to modernize the US air traffic system. The aim is to ease the effects of bad weather and congestion by opening new room to efficiently and safely operate more planes.
Industry's slow adoption of the GPS-based system, more than 10 years after its introduction, illustrates the inconsistencies that have defined modernization of the world's busiest air space.
Politics, bureaucratic missteps, mixed priorities, and financial downturns that have sapped industry finances have all factored into the drawn out effort.
The navigation initiative, introduced in the mid-1990s by Alaska Airlines, requires carriers to pay for new equipment, cockpit displays and training crews.
"It is absolutely where the industry is heading," said Basil Barimo, vice president of operations and safety for the industry's lead trade group, the Air Transport Association. "Everyone will be there over a period of several years."
But the response from carriers has been uneven and the FAA's role has been criticized.
General Electric's Aviation unit, Honeywell, Rockwell Collins, and Naverus are key players in development of precision navigation systems.
SAVINGS FROM SHORTER ROUTES
Airlines prefer to buy new planes equipped with the GPS technology. Those with no or few orders on the books, or strapped for cash, are retrofitting planes piecemeal. Less than half the US fleet is fully equipped.
Southwest is buying new planes and retrofitting existing aircraft at a cost of USD$175 million. The airline currently has more than 500 Boeing 737s and hopes to have its fleet completely outfitted by 2013.
Savings from more direct routes are incremental but it adds up. Southwest hopes to save an estimated 25 million gallons of fuel, or USD$64 million, per year once the fleet update is completed.
Jeff Martin, Southwest's senior director of flight operations, says the business case is solid for the investment. Others are less bullish.
"We've expected more payback than we're seeing," Brian Will of American Airlines said of the company's USD$400 million investment in advanced navigation.
"We stepped forward to make these decisions and this stuff really has got to start moving," Will said.
Airline industry officials complain that the FAA has not moved fast enough to approve changes in routes and airport approaches that would enhance efficiency of the GPS system.
ATA's Barimo described the FAA regulatory review as an "18-step process" that has often left carriers in the dark and unable to plan for long periods.
"That's been a real frustration for our members," he said.
A report in July by the US Transportation Department's internal watchdog, the inspector general, found carriers are not using the new routes.
John Prater, head of the Air Line Pilots Association, the union representing pilots at most major domestic carriers, said too many of the newer approaches simply overlay original ones.
Laura Brown, an FAA spokeswoman, said the agency is accelerating route approvals, and said third-party consultants could have a valuable role to play in speeding up route development.
"We have tried to work with carriers to design routes that people will take advantage of right away," she said.
