DUSHANBE, November 16, 2010, Asia-Plus — The fourth three-day meeting of the Eurasian RVSM (Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum) Air Traffic Management (ATM) Working Group is opening in Dushanbe today.
According to Tajikaeronavigatsiya (Tajik air navigation service), the meeting participants include representatives of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), more than 20 national air navigation services, including Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Russia, as well as representatives of the U.S. Air Force group deployed in Afghanistan.
“Experts from member nations of the Eurasian RVSM will report on state and prospects of works on implementation of events recommended by protocols of the previous meetings of the Eurasia RVSM ATM Working Group,” said the source, “The meeting will also consider issues related to making amendments to the air navigation informational documents.”
The goal of RVSM is to reduce the vertical separation above flight level (FL) 290 from the current 2000-ft minimum to 1000-ft minimum. This will allow aircraft to safely fly more optimum profiles, gain fuel savings and increase airspace capacity. The process of safely changing this separation standard requires a study to assess the actual performance of airspace users under the current separation (2000-ft) and potential performance under the new standard (1000-ft). In 1988, the ICAO Review of General Concept of Separation Panel (RGCSP) completed this study and concluded that safe implementation of the 1000-ft separation standard was technically feasible.
The meeting of the Task Force on Eurasia RVSM Implementation that took place in Moscow on September 1-3, 2009 agreed that November 17, 2011 should be considered a single target date for the simultaneous RVSM implementation in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, the Russian Federation, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The RVSM implementation would be conducted in a coordinated manner with all States concerned. The meeting also agreed to establish two working groups: EURASIA RVSM Air Traffic Management (ATM) Working Group (WG) to tackle ATM issues and EURASIA RVSM Regional Monitoring Agenda (RMA) WG to look into regional RVSM monitoring.
