Aviation authority to reconsider retiring old air traffic control system in light of latest glitch
Previous system currently on cold standby and can be used with one or two hours of preparation
Hong Kong’s Civil Aviation Department will take into account its new air traffic control system’s latest glitch before deciding whether to retire the old one next month as scheduled, Deputy Director-General of Civil Aviation Kevin Choi said on Monday.
“The system will still be here this month. It is now on cold standby mode, meaning that if the need arises, we can still use it after one to two hours (of preparation),” Choi said on a Commercial Radio programme.
Asked if the CAD would take into account the latest glitch and not retire the old system for now, Choi said: “We will take that into consideration. We will also talk to our expert committee about this … we will have a comprehensive consideration.”
The latest issue was caused by the accumulation of air traffic controllers’ preference settings, which exceeded the system limit.
Choi said that when each of the some 400 traffic controllers logged on to the air traffic control system using their own password, they could set their own “preferences”, such as text size and screen brightness.