MCLEAN, VIRGINIA – 5 December 2024 – France’s Direction des Services de la Navigation Aérienne (DSNA) has made a strong commitment to safety, opting to deploy Aireon’s space-based automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast (ADS-B) data for aircraft traffic surveillance for its Cayenne Flight Information Region (FIR).
Under terms of the contract, DSNA will use Aireon’s data across the entire Cayenne FIR, which includes terrestrial and oceanic airspace across 2.8 million square kilometers. The Cayenne FIR covering French Guiana in South America is a critical airspace for South Atlantic traffic; the Aireon data can provide unprecedented visibility of oceanic flights across a busy corridor.
The Cayenne FIR borders several FIRs managed by ANSPs already using Aireon’s ADS-B, including ASECNA to the East, COCESNA and DC-ANSP to the North, and Nav Portugal to the Northeast.
“Cayenne is an important piece of airspace for South trans-Atlantic travel. Similar to the amazing operational benefits seen in the North Atlantic airspace, ANSPs and airlines who operate in the South Atlantic are a step closer to having complete visibility of a flight across the ocean, which could allow operators to more closely space aircraft, increase capacity, and operate more safely in the region,” said Peter Cabooter, Aireon Executive Vice President, Customer Affairs.
Earlier this year, DSNA selected Aireon Locate search and rescue platform for all of its overseas territories, including Cayenne, Paramaribo, Piarco, and Tahiti FIRs.
“Cayenne has already implemented ground-based ADS-B which proved its effectiveness over the terrestrial component of the FIR. Space-based ADS-B is expected to provide new capabilities for Cayenne ATC by considerably expanding the surveillance area, in particular toward the wide oceanic airspace. Ultimately, implementing space-based surveillance supports reducing spacing between flights, which are today quite conservative, given the lack of real-time surveillance over the ocean,” said Frédéric Guignier, DSNA Director.
