1. Southwest Airlines AMDAR Participation and Benefits
Rick Curtis
Chief Meteorologist

2. SWA/AirTran Cities

3. SWA/AirTran Cities - International

4. SWA/AirTran Aircraft Type Number Seats 717-200 88 117 737-300 128 137 20
122
424
137/143 34
175
Total
694

5. SWA/AirTran Facts and Figures
In April 2012, the AirTran fleet began transitioning to Southwest.
3500+ daily flights from 97 airports
606 Boeing 737 aircraft (300’s, 500’s, 700’s, 800’s)
88 Boeing 717 aircrafts (200’s)
Southwest/AirTran consumed 1.9 billion gallons of jet fuel in 2012
Average flight length is 694 miles
Shortest: 148 miles (AUS-HOU)
Longest: 2,329 miles (BWI-LAX)
9/6/13

6. Reporting Aircraft Wind/Temperature - 70
Water Vapor – 87 – plus wind/temperature
Turbulence – EDR – 85+ expected

7. Reporting Rates 6 sec intervals to 90 secs from OFF
20 sec intervals to 510 secs to TOC
3 min. intervals to
TOD
60 sec intervals
to ON

8. 24 Hours of SWA Reports 82,000 + observations

9. 24 Hours of SWA Water Vapor Reports 48,000 + observations

10. Sounding

11. Why Participate Improves forecasts – external and internal.
Improves both terminal and en route forecasts.
Better forecasts result in more efficient operations.
Strengthens partnership with NWS.
Integrated into forecast models.
Used by local forecast offices.
Supplement radiosondes.
Integrate real-time turbulence information into operations to improve safety.
Plans include:
Operational usage within Dispatch
“Smart alarming” to the cockpit.
Integration with other weather information made available to flight crews.

12. Where do you start? Obtain Executive level sponsorship.
Identify key individuals within Maintenance, Engineering, Operations, and Legal to assist with program.
Negotiate and execute legal agreements.
Modify avionics software to database and report.
Activate aircraft reporting.
Establish ACMS software tracking.
Communicate to Dispatchers and Pilots implementation details.

13. What additional effort is needed with Water Vapor reporting?
Requires a part time project manager.
Provide input into the STC process – installation and removal.
Write installation and maintenance procedures.
Create installation schedules for targeted aircraft.
Develop and implement processes for routine maintenance.

14. Why “do” Water Vapor?
Very little additional bandwidth required to downlink data.
Carrier has not been responsible for obtaining the STC – just provide the consulting support.
Installed during “heavy checks” so no significant impact to operations.
Water vapor measurements are essential to the forecasting process.
Greatly fills in “gaps” between 00Z and 12Z radiosondes.

15. Turbulence
SWA has worked over a series of years with NCAR for equation development.
Integrate into avionics software. (cost)
Install on aircraft and track software revisions.
Test, test, and re-test to gain acceptance from all sides.
Integrate into displays to consolidate information.
Implement data into operational decision making.

16. Lessons Learned Problem with water vapor hose installations.
Inventory tracking – multiple installation sites.
Amount of acceptable inventory.
Software upgrades overwrite reporting capabilities.
Competing company ACMS resource priorities.
Older ACMS could not accommodate data load of EDR equations.

17. SWA Benefits
Assists with internal forecasting efforts for fog, thunderstorm development, precipitation type forecasting.
Provides a good source of information for turbulence and other weather related internal research activities.
Offers a positive Public Relations effort demonstrating public-private partnerships and environmental focus.
Costs involved with program are essentially covered.
Beginning to explore the employment of this data for more precise fuel planning activities.

18. Thanks very much!