Austin airport one of 4 nationwide to receive new runway safety technology
The Austin-Bergstrom International Airport is one of four airports nationwide to receive new technology to help enhance runway safety, the Federal Aviation Administration announced Monday.
Editor's note: The above video shows KXAN News' top morning headlines from Monday, April 15, 2024.
AUSTIN (KXAN) -- The Austin-Bergstrom International Airport is one of four airports nationwide to receive new technology to help enhance runway safety, the Federal Aviation Administration announced Monday.
AUS, the Indianapolis International Airport, the Nashville International Airport and Dallas Love Field are the recipients of the new airfield surveillance systems, the FAA said. The focus of the new technology is to "reduce the risk of runway incursions by improving air traffic controllers' situational awareness," per a release.
The FAA is poised to install the systems at all four airports by July 2024, while additional airports are expected to receive the technology by the end of 2025, the release added.
The Surface Awareness Initiative (SAI) system will help display surface traffic to airport controllers who might not otherwise have a surface surveillance tool. The technology will display aircrafts and related vehicles as icons on the airport map, in addition to highlighting where runways, taxiways and hold ramps are.
The SAI system is one of the new developments. Other tools to be applied include an Approach Runway Verification (ARV) and the Runway Incursion Device (RID).
"We're committed to doing everything possible to make our runways even safer," FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker said in the release. "This cost-effective technology provides controllers with timely and accurate depictions of aircraft and vehicles on the entire airfield in all weather conditions."
The new technology enhancement comes more than a year after the FAA launched an investigation into an incident involving two aircrafts at AUS. During that incident, a FedEx plane had been cleared to land on the same AUS runway that a controller later authorized a Southwest Airlines flight to take off from.
There had been heavy fog in Austin during the incident. The FedEx plane was able to discontinue its landing, while the Southwest flight safely took off.