Introducing Optimate: Aid for pilots, offering enhanced vision and audio capabilities.

Airbus' Optimate Project Automates Airport Ground Operations for Safer and More Efficient Flights

The aviation industry is gearing up for a significant expansion over the next two decades, with the global jetliner fleet predicted to double to meet demand. This growth, however, brings challenges, particularly in terms of airport congestion and complex airspace navigation. To address these issues, Airbus has launched the Optimate project, an innovative initiative aimed at reducing pilot workload, increasing safety, and digitally assisting collaboration between flight crews and air traffic control.

Alleviating Pilot Workload and Enhancing Safety

Taxiing an aircraft on the ground is a demanding task that requires constant attention, coordination with ground control, and precise handling, all under potentially complex and congested airport conditions. By automating the taxi process, Optimate reduces the manual input pilots must provide during this phase, allowing them to focus more on monitoring, communication, and other operational priorities.

Automation lowers the risk of taxiing errors, such as runway incursions or collisions with ground vehicles and obstacles, thereby enhancing overall safety. It also helps in optimizing taxi routes and speeds, contributing to smoother and more efficient airport surface operations.

Technology at the Heart of Automated Taxi Operations

Optimate employs autonomous taxi technology that integrates sensors, cameras, and advanced navigation systems to perceive the environment around the aircraft. It uses real-time data processing and advanced algorithms to plan and execute the taxi path safely and efficiently.

The system interfaces with existing aircraft avionics and airport infrastructure, including ground traffic signals and communications. Key technologies include LiDAR, radar, GPS, and computer vision to detect obstacles and precise positioning. The automation features work as a collaborative tool with pilots, who can supervise and intervene if necessary.

The 'Flying Truck' and the Future of Airport Operations

The Optimate project is a three-year partnership involving industry stakeholders, researchers, and regulatory bodies, including the French Civil Aviation Authority. The 'flying truck', a unique, fully-electric, truck-like vehicle, registered as OPTI1, equipped with an A350 virtual flight deck and sensor technology, including computer vision devices, 4D radar, lidar, and geo-locating sensors, is a key component of this initiative.

Initially, the focus is on the taxi phase of the mission. Optimate will shift up another gear during the fourth quarter of 2024 with the demonstration of automated taxi operations on board an Airbus A350-1000 test aircraft. The 'flying truck' has already been trialled at UpNext's headquarters near Toulouse and on the runways of Blagnac airport, and plans are to take it to an international airport. Thousands of hours of tests will be performed by the 'flying truck' to keep costs down, free up test pilots for other tasks, and reduce the project's CO emissions.

In summary, Airbus' Optimate automates aircraft taxi operations on the airport surface by using sensor fusion and advanced navigation technologies, which reduces pilot workload and improves safety by minimizing human errors during ground maneuvers. The 'flying truck', representing the type of functions that could one day alleviate pilot workload, allows flight crews to focus primarily on critical decision-making, acting as a virtual assistant to safely and automatically guide an aircraft during taxi. The ultimate aim is to perform an efficient 'gate-to-gate' mission on an Airbus commercial airliner, featuring 4D trajectory flight management, a tablet-operated connected virtual assistant, and overridable protections.

Introducing Optimate: Aid for pilots, offering enhanced vision and audio capabilities.