Trajectory control technology

An instrument landing system (ILS) allows landing even with poor visibility caused by bad weather if the airport is furnished with it. However there are only a few domestic runways that can accomodate instrument approach because an ILS requires at least a 5 km straight path to the runway. If there are mountains or populated areas around an airport, ILS cannot be adopted. Because a visual/contact approach is necessary at a runway without ILS, low visibility has come to account for a quarter of the reasons given for flight cancellation.

Introduction of the Ground Based Augmentation System (GBAS) into airports is in progress to improve the precision of satellite positioning by GPS around an airport. The GBAS provides precise positional information to an aircraft pilot.

As a part of the DREAMS project, JAXA has developed technology which generates a curved approach route having a straight section as long as 2 km, which allows an approach using automatic operation.