Recat-Eu
Recat-Eu
Recat-Eu
DOCUMENT INFORMATION
TITLE
"RECAT-EU" European Wake Turbulence Categorisation
and Separation Minima on Approach and Departure
Edition Number: 1.1 Edition Date: 15/07/2015
Abstract
This document presents the European Wake Turbulence Categorisation and Separation
Minima on Approach and Departure “RECAT-EU”, available for operational deployment.
It also provides information about deployment benefits and possible support from
EUROCONTROL to local Stakeholders.
Keywords
RECAT-EU Wake turbulence Runway throughput Runway capacity
Authors
Frédéric Rooseleer, Vincent Treve
Contact(s) Person Email Unit
Paul Adamson [email protected] NMD/NOM/APT
Publications
EUROCONTROL Headquarters
96 Rue de la Fusée
B-1130 BRUSSELS
Tel: +32 (0)2 729 1152
Fax: +32 (0)2 729 5149
E-mail: [email protected]
DOCUMENT APPROVAL
The following table identifies all management authorities who have successively approved
the present issue of this document.
CONTENTS
DOCUMENT INFORMATION ......................................................................................... 3
CONTENTS ................................................................................................................... 5
ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................................................ 25
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This document presents the European wake turbulence categories and separation minima on
approach and departure, “RECAT-EU”, available for operational deployment.
The demand is high for airport capacity and efficiency at some European airports, and in particular for
increased runway throughput.
During recent years, knowledge about wake vortex behaviour in the operational environment has
increased thanks to measured data and improved understanding of physical processes. It is mainly
for this reason that it was possible to revise wake turbulence categorisation and corresponding
separation minima.
The European Organisation for the Safety of Air Navigation (EUROCONTROL), in consultation with its
Stakeholders, has developed a re-categorisation of ICAO wake turbulence longitudinal separation
minima on approach and departure, called “RECAT-EU”.
The RECAT-EU scheme is based on a set of principles, comparing the wake generation and wake
resistance between aircraft types, and splitting ICAO HEAVY and MEDIUM categories into ‘Upper’
(‘Larger’) and ‘Lower’ (‘Smaller’). This split has been based on aircraft type characteristics.
This allows reduction of separation minima for some traffic pairs of aircraft, enabling runway
throughput increase, whilst maintaining acceptable levels of safety.
Safety benefits are also delivered for some smaller aircraft types, by increasing their separation
minima and/or change of category grouping, hence reducing the risk of wake turbulence-induced
accidents for the most vulnerable types.
RECAT-EU is supported by a comprehensive safety case, based on a quantified pair-wise wake
turbulence risk assessment, and reviewed during Stakeholders consultation over 9-month period.
The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) has then conducted a technical review, and, with
complementary analysis and assurance provided by AIRBUS about CAT-A aircraft / A380, confirmed
in a letter to Member States that the safety case report provides the assurance that the RECAT-EU
wake turbulence scheme can be used by States and Air Navigation Service Providers as a basis to
update their current schemes.
RECAT-EU deployment will bring immediate capacity benefits, with additional movements in peak
traffic periods, and / or reduce time to land or depart a traffic sequence. These benefits are expected
to further increase over time as the overall fleet mix is forecasted to evolve towards larger aircraft – a
mitigation for the lack of runway capacity foreseen in EUROCONTROL’s 2013 ‘Challenges to Growth’
study.
RECAT-EU will also provide a more rapid recovery from adverse conditions, helping to reduce the
overall delay and will also enable improvements in ATFM slot compliance through the flexibility
afforded by reduced departure separations.
The cost of RECAT-EU deployment is considered to be moderate, limited to local flight data
processing system changes associated with the new wake vortex categories, and controller training.
Some resources may also have to be dedicated to awareness of flight crews.
The RECAT-EU deployment will necessitate a collaborative approach involving all Stakeholders: Air
Navigation Service Provider, Airport-based Airline(s), Airport Company and Authorities.
Chapter 1 Introduction
The demand is high for airport capacity and efficiency at some European airports, and in
particular for increased runway throughput from an ANS/ATM perspective.
Runway capacity and efficiency use is often directly linked with the minimum separation
between aircraft. These minima are constrained by ATS surveillance capabilities and wake
turbulence.
During recent years, knowledge about wake vortex behaviour in the operational environment
has increased thanks to recorded data and improved understanding of physical processes. It
is mainly for this reason that it was possible to revise wake turbulence categorisation and
corresponding separation minima to enable optimisation of airport capacity and efficiency
whilst maintaining acceptable levels of safety.
The European Organisation for the Safety of Air Navigation (EUROCONTROL), in
consultation with its Stakeholders, has developed a re-categorisation of ICAO wake
turbulence scheme and associated longitudinal separation minima on approach and
departure, called “RECAT-EU”, to the benefits of Airports and ATM Network Performance
enhancement.
Chapter 2 RECAT-EU
Solution
• Concept:
It is a new categorisation of aircraft for the traditional ICAO, whose aim is to safely increase
arrival and/or departure capacity at airports by redefining wake turbulence categories and
their associated separation minimum.
A380-800 6 NM 7 NM 8 NM
HEAVY 4 NM 5 NM 6 NM
MTOM ≥ 136 tons
MEDIUM 5 NM
7 tons ≤ MTOM < 136 tons
LIGHT
MTOM < 7 tons
Note 1: The Airbus A380-800 (A388), with a maximum take-off mass in the order of 560 000
kg, is the largest passenger aircraft ever entered into revenue service. The aircraft is in the
HEAVY wake turbulence category, which has no defined upper limit. For the A380-800, an
ICAO State guidance released in 2008 recommends an increase in relation to the wake
turbulence separation minima published in the ICAO Doc 4444 PANS-ATM.
Note 2: When a wake turbulence restriction is not required, then separation reverts to radar
separation minimum (MRS):
• as prescribed by ICAO as minimum radar separation (MRS) being 3NM (or 2.5NM under
given conditions described in Doc 4444), or;
• as prescribed by the appropriate ATS authority.
This means that each category may cover a wide range of different sized aircraft, what leads
to over-conservative separations in many cases, and so a loss of runway throughput.
HEAVY
category:
Figure 1: Comparison of aircraft size between AIRBUS A340-600 and BOEING B767-300 (planform
1
top view)
Both A346 and B763 are in the current ICAO HEAVY category, whilst their wing spans have a
difference of more than 15 metres.
Therefore, they suffer from over-conservative separations when leader.
1
“A340FAMILY2v1.0” by Julien.scavini, used under CC BY / derivative work from original
“B767FAMILYv1.0” by Julien.scavini, used under CC BY / derivative work from original
4 NM
ICAO
current separations
Safe, but over conservative.
2.5 NM
RECAT-EU separations
Figure 2: Comparison of wake turbulence separation minimum applicable to A340-600
following B767-300 between ICAO and RECAT-EU scheme
MEDIUM
category:
Figure 3: Comparison of aircraft size between AIRBUS A320 and EMBRAER ERJ-145
2
(planform top view)
Both A320 and E145 are in the current ICAO MEDIUM category, whilst their wing spans have
a difference of more than 12 metres.
Therefore, the A320 suffers from over conservative separations when follower.
2
“EMBRAER-ERJv1.0” by Julien.scavini, used under CC BY / derivative work from original
“A32XFAMILYv1.0” by Julien.scavini, used under CC BY / derivative work from original
5 NM
5 NM
Figure 4: ICAO wake turbulence separation minimum applicable to A320 and to ERJ-
145 following A340-600
4 NM
5 NM
RECA
T-EU separations
Tackling this problem has brought out a much more precise categorisation in Europe:
RECAT-EU. It divides the current HEAVY and MEDIUM categories into two sub-categories and
creates a new SUPER HEAVY one for the AIRBUS A380.
Figure 6: Categorisation process and criteria for assigning an existing aircraft type into RECAT-EU
scheme
Figure 7: RECAT-EU wake turbulence categories and example aircraft type assignment
All certificated aircraft types (as per ICAO designators) before 1ST of January 2013 have
been assigned in RECAT-EU scheme, with examples provided in Table 2.
Table 2: Example list of aircraft types assigned to RECAT-EU categories (Category names and letters
are indicative)
The separations minima applicable between the RECAT-EU wake turbulence categories are
provided in Table 3 and Table 4.
“SUPER
“A” 3 NM 4 NM 5 NM 5 NM 6 NM 8 NM
HEAVY”
“UPPER
“B” 3 NM 4 NM 4 NM 5 NM 7 NM
HEAVY”
“LOWER
“C” (*) 3 NM 3 NM 4 NM 6 NM
HEAVY”
“UPPER
“D” 5 NM
MEDIUM”
“LOWER
“E” 4 NM
MEDIUM”
“LIGHT” “F” 3 NM
“SUPER
“A” 100s 120s 140s 160s 180s
HEAVY”
“UPPER
“B” 100s 120s 140s
HEAVY”
“LOWER
“C” 80s 100s 120s
HEAVY”
“UPPER
“D” 120s
MEDIUM”
“LOWER
“E” 100s
MEDIUM”
It remains optional to locally deploy part of the RECAT-EU scheme, or apply larger
separation minima than proposed ones, or opt for a progressive application.
The Table 5 presents the delta variations in WT distance-based separation minima between
categories when compared to reference ICAO reference scheme. The figures provided
between brackets correspond to a MRS of 2.5 Nm as reference.
-1 (-1.5)
“LOWER HEAVY” “C” -1 NM -2 NM -1 NM
NM
(+ 0.5
“LIGHT” “F”
NM)
• The runway throughput benefits can reach 5% or more during peak periods
depending on individual airport traffic mix
• For an equivalent throughput, RECAT-EU also allows a reduction of the overall flight
time for an arrival or departure sequence of traffic, and this is beneficial to the whole
traffic sequence. This may offer more flexibility for the Controllers to manage the
traffic.
• RECAT-EU will also enable more rapid recovery from adverse conditions, helping to
reduce the overall delay and will also enable improvements in ATFM slot compliance
through the flexibility afforded by reduced departure separations
• The gain in capacity could even increase further by 2020 due to evolution of traffic
mix. Indeed, the benefits are expected to further increase over time as the overall
fleet mix is forecasted to evolve towards larger aircraft, a mitigation for the lack of
runway capacity foreseen in EUROCONTROL’s 2013 ‘Challenges to Growth’ study.
Figure 8: Arrival throughput increase enabled by RECAT-EU with predicted 2017 traffic mix during
morning peak period
Chapter 3 RECAT-EU
Deployment
The RECAT-EU scheme may be applied in full or in part, to update or replace the current
wake separation scheme applied locally.
The operational use of RECAT-EU scheme will require limited changes to the ATM functional
system. These changes must be subject to a local safety assessment.
Appendix A Rationale of
RECAT-EU design methodology
The RECAT-EU methodology is built on gained knowledge about wake physics during
several EC. R&D projects (ATC WAKE, CREDOS,…) and expertise developed by
EUROCONTROL with the ICAO working group activity and safety cases on A380 and B747-
8 wake separation and during a first wake related concept in CDG in 2008 (WIDAO).
Wake data collected at London Heathrow and Frankfurt were made available for allowing
reviewer (EASA) to re-run the analysis and confirm the results of the EUROCONTROL
Safety Case3.
The final approach speed profiles have been established from Mode-S and RADAR
measurements collected during 2 years respectively at London Heathrow and Paris Charles
de Gaulle.
1
RECAT-EU Safety Case - Appendix C - Wake Vortex Data (Document and Data Files, Covered by NDA)
2
RECAT-EU Safety Case - Appendix D - Aircraft Types and Arrival Traffic Data (Document and Data Files,
Covered by NDA)
3
RECAT-EU Safety Case report edition 1.3 issued by EUROCONTROL
4
RECAT-EU Safety Case - Appendix A - Initial Wake Turbulence Clustering And Categorisation (Document)
The formulation of the severity metric was developed by a panel recognized European
Experts, who were not contracted and contributed “under their own name” 6.
This confirmed the non-linear influence of individual vortex spacing on wake decay
properties.
Generalisation of the results to departure phase was based on wake database collected in
Frankfurt airport (‘EDDF-2’) described in CREDOS project documentation8.
RECAT-EU also allows faster recovery to nominal planning and reduction of cumulative
delay (See Annex 2).
The main reason of this difference comes from the categorisation and separation reduction
for aircraft types which are predominant in European traffic (AIRBUS A320 and BOEING
B737NG aircraft families). In addition, the reduced separation behind the A380 brings
significant benefits for the airports where this aircraft is present in the traffic mix.
5
A380 Flight Test Working Group closure report for ICAO wake separation - EASA
6
RECAT-EU Safety Case - Appendix B - Wake Turbulence Severity Metric (Document and Data Files, Covered
by NDA)
7
RECAT-EU Safety Case - Appendix C - Wake Vortex Data (Document and Data Files, Covered by NDA)
8
The CREDOS Project EDDF 6-Month Wake and Weather Dataset RWY25L/R
The RECAT-EU proposal and safety case was reviewed by a Task Force including
EUROCONTROL Stakeholders (Civil Aviation Authorities and ANSPs), research community
and aircraft manufacturers during a 9-months consultation.
EUROCONTROL modified and clarified the safety case to the satisfaction of all reviewers.
Based on the recommendation of the Task Force, the EUROCONTROL Agency Advisory
Board agreed to submit the Safety case to EASA for review.
Appendix B RECAT-EU
Safety Case Documentation
Appendix D – Aircraft types and arrival traffic Data (Restricted access under NDA)
ABBREVIATIONS
EC European Commission
NM Nautical Mile
RECAT Re-categorisation
WT Wake Turbulence