Airbus and avionics maker Honeywell have collaborated to offer their separately developed landing aids as a packaged deal.
Customers are now able to order Honeywell’s SmartLanding and the Runway Overrun Prevention System (ROPS) developed by Airbus subsidiary Navblue as a combined solution. The combination is targeted to be certified on both Airbus and non-Airbus aircraft.
ROPS is a performance-based alerting system developed by Airbus, which assists crews in preventing runway overruns. Predictive software generates a variety of visual and spoken warnings if the system detects a risk of runway overrun. Certified by the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC), ROPS is in operation on more than 800 aircraft, including A320, A330, A350 and A380. ROPS has also been selected on 1500 aircraft yet to be delivered.
Honeywell’s SmartLanding system reduces the risk of runway excursion by alerting pilots if the aircraft is approaching the runway too high, too fast or is not configured properly for landing. It also confirms which runway is being approached, a useful final check at a busy airport using parallel runways. SmartLanding is a software enhancement to Honeywell’s Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System (EGPWS) installed on more than 30,000 commercial and business aviation aircraft.
