Needs Time To Sort Out Costs

Australia has done an about-face on ADS-B. After a request last year for proposals from avionics manufacturers for the purchase and installation of automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast avionics for general aviation aircraft, this week ATC-provider Airservices Australia abruptly cancelled the RFP process.

The decision means there will be no ADS-B technology available to pilots flying below 30,000 feet in the land down under... and that decision isn't likely to be amended anytime soon.

Why did the ATC operation cancel the plan? The Australian newspaper reports that, in the words of Airservices CEO Greg Russell... the job of equipping all GA aircraft with the new systems required to take advantage of the traffic separation technology... as well as the sheer number of operations at lower altitudes... makes introducing ADS-B in lower airspace "a significantly more complex matter than upper level airspace."

Airservices adds it needs more time to sort out the costs... as well as respond to those who are critical of the system, such as former CASA chairman Dick Smith.

While low-level ADS-B in Australia is dead, at least for now... Airservices says it remains committed to its upper airspace ADS-B program, that went online for the first time just over one year ago.

Full implementation of the program, however, has also been delayed.

FMI: www.airservicesaustralia.com