Vaisala lands $2.7 million order

LOUISVILLE – Finland-based Vaisala Inc.’s U.S. headquarters in Louisville received a contract extension from the Federal Aviation Administration to provide air-traffic control systems for runways at airports across the U.S.

The contract, an extension of a previous contract signed in June 2005, is worth $2.7 million for 16 basic runway visual range systems made by Vaisala in Louisville.

The Vaisala AviMet PC-Based Runway Visual Range system is used mainly by air-traffic controllers who access data through an improved display application, also developed by Vaisala.

Runway visual range is a calculated assessment of the distance that a pilot can see down a runway. Prevailing weather conditions have the most impact on vision, but ambient light levels and runway light settings also play an important part in the equation.

In addition to having an impact on flight safety, correct information on visual range also has an impact on airport capacity as runways can be safely kept open longer under diminishing weather conditions.

Vaisala’s PC-based system provides fully automated runway visual range assessment and reporting. The system consists of Vaisala’s optical sensors for determining meteorological optical range and measuring ambient light level and a newly developed runway light intensity monitor. A data-processing unit collects the data, calculates visual ranges and provides the data to users via various interfaces.

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