Incheon International Airport will be transformed into ‘Smart Airport’

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport and Incheon International Airport Corporation announced on June 10 that it will actively introduce a smart integrated control platform to drastically improve aircraft safety at Incheon International Airport and handle future aviation demands in a timely manner.

The iCWP (integrated Controller Working Position) is a future control system that integrates several systems used in control towers with minimal equipment and applies advanced technology.

London City Airport has been operating the system since 2019, and Sweden has been operating four small airports, including the eastern port city of Sundsvall, remotely from the central control center since 2015.

iCWP can proactively react to the situation where the aircraft collides with the ground moving object in case the aircraft is out of the sight of the controller and the visibility distance is shortened due to nighttime and fog, especially as the aircraft operation increases and the ground moving movement of the aircraft becomes complicated.

The aircraft commercial office announces a low-correction warning when the visibility of Incheon International Airport is less than 400m due to the possibility of obstacles to aircraft takeoff and landing due to the short visibility caused by weather deterioration such as fog.

Incheon International Airport's iCWP construction project will be carried out through stages 1 and 2.

The first stage project will be based on the investment of 11.2 billion won to view various data that have been shown on various screens such as video information, weather, and ground observation information, radar information, and departure and flight arrival information coming into the closed-circuit (CCTV) at the second passenger terminal can be seen all together on one screen.

Along with enhancing the controller's awareness of the situation, it visualizes the movement of aircraft located in every corner that was difficult to detect with existing facilities.

A more stable control environment will be created by September 2024 by adding information on the location, distance, and movement between aircraft and ground-operated vehicles to provide collision and out-of-path prediction alerts.

Systems such as ground radar currently in use predict the risk of collisions at front and back between aircraft and then predict the risk of front and back collisions between aircraft and ground-operated vehicles through image-based (object recognition).

In the second stage, which begins in September 2024, the scope of application will be expanded to passenger terminal 1.

Based on AI technology, it plans to check the accuracy of voice messages exchanged frequently between controllers and pilots in real-time, and to introduce an additional function that AI creates the optimal travel path for aircraft in airports using big data.

With this iCWP construction project, Incheon Airport is expected to further enhance the safety of the airport by preventing aircraft ground accidents and improving the control environment. In addition, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport expects to accumulate technologies for future airport construction by securing related technologies for remote control and unmanned control and gain an upper hand in the intensifying competition in the airport industry in the future.

Joo Jong-wan, airport policy division officer at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, said, "We will do our best to ensure airport safety so that passengers can use the aircraft with more confidence by drastically improving the environment of Incheon International Airport's control service."

Reported by Smart City Today