Serbia’s Prime Minister inaugurates Belgrade’s new air traffic control centre

Mirko Cvetkovic, Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia and Nikola Stankov, President of the Executive Board of Serbia & Montenegro Air Traffic Services Agency (SMATSA) inaugurated Belgrade’s new Air Traffic Control Centre building in the presence of Boris Tadic, President of the Republic of Serbia.

Thales EUROCAT-T tower automation system

This is a first step in the implementation of the Future Air traffic Management Modernisation (FAMUS) programme in line with European strategic plans outlined by Eurocontrol and the European Commission for a unified European Air Traffic Control. In 2011, Serbia and Montenegro’s Air Traffic Services Agency will benefit from a new ATC centre based on Thales latest generation EUROCAT air traffic management system integrating a voice communication system, a message handling system and a telecommunication network. With 40 controller positions, the control centre will provide a complete en-route and approach control capability at Belgrade and Podgorica airports, increasing safety and efficiency in the Serbian and Montenegro airspace.

Rémi Gille, Thales Vice President for ATM business, says: “We are delighted to strengthen our relationship with SMASTA. As the largest industry contributor to the European modernisation programme SESAR, Thales is uniquely placed to assist SMATSA’s modernisation of its ATM infrastructure. Its leading-edge technology and integrated solutions for civil aviation authorities worldwide allow for increased capacity”.

Thales has built a solid partnership with SMATSA and has already supplied four primary and secondary radar systems since 2004. Thales is a world leader in air traffic control management systems and civil radars, with a market share of 70% for navigation aid systems. Thales offers an integrated “gate to gate” solution, from the phase prior to take-off right through to landing, in order to guarantee airport security, the efficiency of air traffic management activities, the sharing of aircraft data and the transparency of transfer operations between territories.

European Sky will provide a revised legal framework for more efficient, performance driven, safer and greener procedures in European air traffic, the SESAR programme will deliver technological solutions, functionalities, systems and standards for deployment in Europe. Thales has been at the forefront of the SESAR programme (Single European Sky ATM Research programme) since its inception, and is today part the industrial member having the largest investment level in it.

Thales participates, under the supervision of the SESAR JU (Joint Undertaking) that it is part of, in all the work packages and in about 130 out of the nearly 200 individual projects already attributed. Thales has been selected to co-lead the three work packages dedicated to the development of the new generation of Air Traffic Control systems, of the System Wide Information management system, which will be the backbone of the European ATM network, and of Communication – Navigation – Surveillance technologies. It will bring a major contribution to the work packages dedicated to aircraft avionics systems and airport systems.