Nepal’s second international airport goes for RNP-AR amid failure to secure ILS permission from India
KATHMANDU, Jan 7: With the lack of support from Indian authorities for the operation of flights at the Gautam Buddha International Airport (GBIA) through the Instrument Landing System (ILS), the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) is set to facilitate flights through alternative means using the satellite-based landing approach from January 23.
This system is referred to as Required Navigation Performance Authorization Required (RNP AR), in which sufficiently equipped aircraft with adequately trained pilots can land at the airport in lower visibility conditions, according to Deputy Director General of the CAAN Hansa Raj Pandey.
It's a type of technology used in aviation to help pilots navigate safely and accurately during specific parts of their flight, like when approaching or landing at airports. The permission from Indian authorities is a must to operate ILS at GBIA, which is located close to the Indian border.
He informed Republica that a validation flight for the operation of RNP AR at the GBIA has been successfully completed and now commercial flights can use this system starting January 23.
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“We successfully conducted a validation flight for RNP AR on December 8 at the GBIA with help from international airliners,” Pandey said, “Since the validation was successful and the compulsory 42 days time period between the validation flight and the operation of flights ends on January 22, airline operators are welcome to operate flights at GBIA through the RNP AR approach from January 23.”
According to the General Manager of the GBIA Pratap Babu Tiwari, international airline operators would need to first receive permission from the aviation authority of their respective home countries and complete training for their pilots in order to operate flights through the RNP AR approach at the airport.
“The airline operators would need to receive permission to use the RNP AR approach from not just the CAAN but also from the aviation authority of their home countries,” Tiwari told Republica, “In addition, they would have to furnish the proof of adequate training for their pilots to CAAN.”
Flights operating at the GBIA are currently facing difficulties landing aircraft at the airport from 6 pm to 10 am due to poor visibility conditions. The ILS installed at the airport has proven to be useless after Indian authorities denied an adequate entry route for the operation of the system. General Manager Tiwari had foreseen this potential problem and wrote to the CAAN on April 29, five days after his appointment at the GBIA, requesting the installation of RNP AR approach at the airport.
“Due to low visibility, winter flights at the GBIA have to be diverted to other airports, discouraging international airliners to operate flights at the airport,” the letter read, “To address this problem, I request expedited efforts to install RNP AR at the GBIA by the soonest.”
Although acting late on the request of Tiwari, CAAN had explored alternative approaches for the operation of flights during winter and concluded that the RNP AR approach would be a suitable alternative. Initially, it seemed that the operation of flights through the alternative method seemed unlikely to take place during this winter due to the lengthy timeline for validation of the method at the GBIA.
However, the operation of flights through the alternative method that requires on-board navigation performance monitoring and alerting has come into fruition early through expedited efforts from the CAAN and the government.
In this endeavor, international airline operators assisted CAAN in the operation of validation flights, skipping the entire step for tender publication and competition, CAAN officials said.
Deputy Director General Pandey told Republica that Qatar Airways, FlyDubai and Thai AirAsia helped operate the validation flight quickly after the CAAN decided to install the RNP AR approach at GBIA. In the case of Tribhuvan International Airport, the validation flight was operated with help from Qatar Airways and a subsidiary of aircraft manufacturer Airbus.
“Unlike TIA where the validation flight was assisted by Airbus which only validated RNP AR for Airbus aircraft, GBIA will be able to facilitate flights through the RNP AR method for both Airbus and Boeing aircraft.”
