By Philip Butterworth-Hayes
The UK’s largest air navigation service provider NATS is to roll out four UTM data services as part of its NATS OpenAir platform, according to Andy Sage, Director of Safety Transformation, speaking at the DroneX event in London Today.
Airspace authorisation, traffic information service, geographical awareness services and a flight plan noticeboard will provide foundational data services which UTM service providers will be able to purchase as part of their tactical UTM airspace management offerings to drone operators.
These have been identified through NATS consultation with stakeholders as the priority services which the regulated part of the organisation – NATS (En Route) plc (NERL) – will provide to tactical airspace managers, said Andy Sage. In this regard, NATS will be a data service provider, not an airspace manager. As part of the consultation, NATS has set up an industry group which includes airports, the military and independent USSPs to advise on what data products NATS should develop. A second round of consultation will be launched later this year to discuss the next round of potential service delivery – including post flight analysis fairness monitoring and negotiation, communications and weather – with the NATS proposals on this second tranche to be delivered to the regulator in June 2024.
NERL is regulated economically by the Civil Aviation Authority.
However, before the UK can deploy fully certified UTM services to the drone and eVTOL industries, USSPs, providing the airspace management service, will need to be certified by the regulator, and there is no clear understanding at the moment of how and when that might happen.
