Honeywell’s Boeing 757 Connected Aircraft test bed has returned from Asia after completing a three-week mission to collect crucial weather data.
Unlike last year’s Power of Connected world tour, during which the aircraft visited more than a dozen countries in North America, Europe and Asia while demonstrating the capabilities of the Connected Aircraft, this year’s deployment to Asia was primarily to collect vital scientific weather patterns and data over South East Asia.
Joseph Duval, Honeywell’s chief test pilot, said that Asia has more varied weather patterns than North America, especially at the inter-tropical convergence zone.
It was with this in mind that the team set out during the onset of the Southwest monsoon season, which is characterised by short but heavy thunderstorms.
Weather data is picked up by the Intuvue RDR-4000 3-D radar, which has a detection range of 320 nautical miles and a vertical scan from sea level to 60,000ft.
Other information, such as moisture content, is collected via probes mounted on the test-engine pylon.
Honeywell’s (
www.honeywellnow.com) radar scientists and meteorologists analyse this data to help calibrate the GoDirect weather app, which gives pilots real-time weather data on their flight path and predicts potential turbulence.
For these tests, the aircraft has been based in various countries, including Vietnam, Thailand, Australia, Singapore, Jakarta and Indonesia.