DALLAS — What's a minute worth to you? Southwest Airlines figures it's worth millions.
The Dallas-based carrier is spending $175 million on navigation updates to make its fleet of jets fly more precisely, saving time and and money.
"We're changing the way Southwest Airlines flies," said C. David Newton, Southwest pilot and program manager. "We're modifying airplanes. We're training crews. We're building infrastructure."
At the controls of a Boeing 737 flight simulator, Southwest pilot Kent Perry describes the changes. They're based on the same global positioning satellite (GPS) technology you might be using on the navigation system your car, only more sophisticated.
Satellites can now give Southwest pilots instantaneous feedback on their position in the sky, and that is modifying the way they can fly.
In a simulated approach to Chicago Midway airport, Perry doesn't touch the controls of the airplane as he once did. Instead, he punches numbers into a system that interfaces with satellite data.
"I'm not touching the throttles or the yoke," Perry says as we "fly" over the lights of Chicago. "I'm basically running it with this panel up here."
The plane uses the information to approach the runway, and Perry takes over just before touchdown.
Chicago is a heavily congested airspace. Midway Airport shares some of that space with O'Hare International.
Formerly, air traffic controllers would tell pilots to fly to a point relatively far from Midway to prevent interfering with O'Hare traffic. Then the controllers would direct the pilots to fly from point-to-point in the Midway landing pattern and give them new instructions every time they reached a new point.
Pilots call this technique "dive and drive." They'd be told to go to a certain altitude and a certain point in the air, flying by hand.
Now the landing points can be programmed into the plane's computer before takeoff. Because of precise GPS data, the plane "knows" its position and altitude at all times.
The flight is smoother. Air traffic controllers know exactly where aircraft are at all times, instead of having to wait for the relatively slow radar systems of the past.
That means aircraft can use more direct routes and can fly closer together.
"If we save one minute off each flight — which doesn't sound like a lot — we win," said Newton, who's been in charge of making the transition at Southwest. "We have 3,000 flights a day. You start adding all that up and it's a significant amount of time in the air and gas used. Environmentally it's better for everybody."
The system can't be used at every U.S. airport yet. It requires modifications on the ground as well as in the air.
It has been implemented in Chicago, and with two busy airports in North Texas — Dallas Love Field and Dallas/Fort Worth International — it will be a welcome addition here.
E-mail: bharris@wfaa.com
