SWISS optimizes Zurich approaches together with Skyguide and Flughafen Zürich AG

Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS) has been playing an active part in the validation of iStream, a new procedure to optimize the wave of early-morning arrivals at Zurich Airport. Following successful trials, the iStream concept will now be definitively adopted. An explanatory video has also been produced illustrating the procedure and its benefits.

The iStream validation project, which is being co-funded by the EU, is intended to optimize peak-time airport arrivals. By assigning “target times” for each flight’s arrival, approach sequences can be established in advance, ensuring efficient approaches for all the flights concerned and avoiding the need to fly holding patterns. This also reduces fuel consumption, along with the associated carbon dioxide emissions.

SWISS is actively involved in the iStream project, and has further refined its own flight management system by issuing target times for arrivals of its flights at Zurich Airport. In a collaboration with Flughafen Zürich AG, Switzerland’s air navigation services provider Skyguide and further airline partners, SWISS conducted a 12-month trial of the iStream concept at Zurich Airport from June 2015. The trial saw the approach sequences for all early-morning arrivals at the airport between 06:00 and 07:00 coordinated in advance by Skyguide to ensure that each of the flights concerned could fly an optimum descent profile.