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People, Skills & Next-Gen, Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies

ATHENIAN (“ATHENs termInal Area redesign & pbN”) is a project set to redesign the Athens Terminal Manoeuvering Area (TMA) and implement satellite Performance Based Navigation (PBN) procedures for aircraft arrivals and departures at Athens International Airport.

The project is co-funded by the European Union under the Connecting Europe Facility – Transport Sector and specifically SESAR framework. The project is implemented by a collaborating group of expert partners comprising of the Hellenic Aviation Service Provider (HASP), AEGEAN, SKY Express, and EUROCONTROL, coordinated by Athens International Airport S.A. (AIA).

The aim is to establish a fully PBN-based airspace concept to align with EU regulation 2018/1048, and the European Air Traffic Management (ATM) Master Plan. The new concept of satellite-based navigation will enhance the airport operations and will reduce reliance on ground-based navigational aids, with clear benefits in:

• flight efficiency,
• aircraft noise and CO₂ emissions,
• cost-efficiency, and
• passenger experience

The ATHENIAN project was launched in January 2023 and is planned for completion by the end of 2027 in a phased manner.

The first phase was completed in January 2024, and includes:

• a full topographical obstacle survey within the boundaries of Athens TMA geographical area,
• the development of 78 “Overlay PBN” arrival and departure procedures in the existing TMA setup.

The second phase began in April 2024, for the comprehensive redesign of the Athens TMA alongside a new set of PBN procedures.
A major milestone was reached in February 2025 with the delivery of the Concept of Operations (ConOps) for the new redesigned TMA. The ATHENIAN project is actively engaging experts of many more industry key contributors such as:

• The Hellenic Civil Aviation Authority (HCAA),
• The Hellenic Air Force (HAF),
• The IATA, AOC (Airline Operators Committee) at Athens Intl. Airport and RYANAIR,
• The General Aviation Users representatives, and
• The Local Communities.

The objective is to ensure and accelerate the PBN implementation in Athens, under the frame of a greater airspace re-design, benefiting from the operational improvements derived from new airspace concepts, in terms of flight efficiency, reduced environment impact and sustainable operations.

Key success factor for the project is the collaborative spirit cultivated between the ATHENIAN project partners and all involved stakeholders, through their active engagement.

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Drones & UTM

D-FLIGHT is the Italian provider of digital services for unmanned aircraft operations, supporting the safe and efficient integration of drones into national airspace. Operating at the intersection of aviation regulation, air traffic management, and digital innovation, D-FLIGHT delivers services that enable compliant, scalable, and interoperable UAS operations. In its first year as a certified U-space Service Provider (USSP), D-FLIGHT successfully transitioned from foundational digital services to operational U-space service delivery, demonstrating compliance with the European regulatory framework. This initial year focused on operational readiness, stakeholder integration, and service reliability, laying the groundwork for scalable U-space operations and contributing to the broader European U-space ecosystem.

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Policy, Regulation & Governance

A6 Alliance and its members are responsible for the safe management of more than 80% of Europe’s air traffic, and more than 70% of the investment in the future European ATM infrastructure. CEOs of the largest ANSPs in Europe discuss Air Traffic Management (ATM) modernisation as a strategic priority for Europe. Why should ATM modernisation be understood as a strategic investment for Europe’s prosperity, resilience and sovereignty, rather than as an operational cost of the aviation sector? What is at stake for Europe’s global competitiveness and technological leadership if ATM modernisation stalls, and how can Europe move faster from R&D to large-scale industrial deployment? To what extent is ATM modernisation a prerequisite for achieving the EU’s climate and sustainability objectives? What concrete political, regulatory, and investment decisions are required now at EU level to ensure ATM modernisation delivers tangible results by 2030 and beyond?

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies, Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM

The future of airspace depends on our ability to harmonize innovation with absolute safety. This session presents a blueprint for the next generation of airport operations, showcasing how AI-driven automation transforms both safety management and ATC efficiency. Airports need more capacity and efficiency but need to avoid brittle automation. This session presents practical, deployable ways to use AI as a secondary safety layer and as assisted ATC automation for airport surface operations. We’ll walk through a production-minded approach that moves from concept to day-to-day ops using modular, interoperable, service-oriented components that can integrate with existing tower and airport infrastructure.

Attendees will see how a real-time safety intelligence layer can detect emerging hazards early (surface conflicts, runway crossings, abnormal taxi behavior) and escalate with clear, auditable alerts. We’ll then show how automation can be introduced safely for clearances and instructions: pushback, taxi routing, and conditional advisories using constraint-based logic, human-in-the-loop controls, and continuous performance monitoring.

Because resilience matters as much as capability, we’ll cover assurance and recovery: graceful degradation under incomplete data, and contingency modes that keep operations safe when automation is unavailable.

A case study and live demonstration will ground the discussion and prove results, including implementation lessons, safety case strategies, and measurable operational impact.

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Seamless Skies for All

As Advanced Air Mobility and autonomous aircraft approach operational deployment, today’s airspace framework—designed for human-centric IFR and VFR operations—faces fundamental limits in supporting highly automated, high-density traffic.
This session introduces Automated Flight Rules (AFR) as a new operating mode for autonomous aircraft, enabling safe, predictable, and scalable operations through digital coordination and automation. Attendees will explore how AFR supports strategic, pre-tactical, and tactical conflict management, allowing automated systems to manage separation and traffic flows at scale.
The session also examines how AFR serves as a bridge between today’s IFR/VFR environment and a future digital, cooperative airspace, enabling crewed and uncrewed aircraft to safely coexist during the transition to automated operations.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies

Abstract:
Over the past decade, artificial intelligence in aviation has been deployed primarily as advisory capability, improving trajectory prediction, anomaly detection, and decision support for human operators. The next decade requires a more fundamental transition: from AI that advises humans to AI that acts as an operational participant. In the future NAS, tool-centric applications will evolve into system-level AI, in which multiple intelligent services coordinate to manage complex operations across ATM, UTM, AAM, and ETM domains. Autonomous digital agents will negotiate airspace access, reconcile conflicting objectives, and coordinate traffic flows, frequently at speeds beyond direct human control.
Discussion will address:
• Autonomous negotiation among aircraft and airspace services
Multi-agent systems supporting separation management, dynamic sequencing, and cross-domain prioritization.
• Global data reconciliation and common APIs
How heterogeneous systems such as ATC decision support tools, airline operations systems, UTM service providers, and weather services share state information through standardized semantics while preventing new failure modes.
• Persistent digital twin operations
Continuous, high-fidelity digital representations of the NAS used for prediction, safety monitoring, what-if analysis, autonomous negotiation, and recovery planning.
• Continuous safety assurance and learning systems
AI that does not just perform a function but continuously evaluates its own performance, detects drift, and adapts within certified bounds.
• Handling off-nominal and degraded operations
How system-level AI responds to unexpected conditions such as:
− rapidly evolving convective weather
− GNSS interference or denial
− demand surges and metering constraints
− mixed-equipage environments and partial automation failure.
Panelists will examine architectures that support resilient, adaptive autonomous behavior while preserving operator authority, traceability, and auditability. The session will explicitly address where full autonomy is appropriate, where human-on-the-loop oversight remains essential, and how decision authority transitions during contingency operations.
Attendees will gain a clear understanding of how AI functions not merely as a system add-on, but as an organizing principle for the future NAS, one that enables the system to maintain safety, capacity, and efficiency during both normal operations and major disruptions, at national and global scales.

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Seamless Skies for All, Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies

Digitalisation is rapidly reshaping Europe’s air traffic management landscape, and SESAR deployment is driving this evolution with concrete, operationally relevant improvements. At the heart of this transformation lies ATM Functionality 5 – System Wide Information Management (SWIM), a cornerstone capability enabling seamless, standardised and real-time information exchange across the network.
In this session, the SESAR Deployment Manager will explore how digitalisation—powered by SWIM’s data-centric approach—is unlocking new levels of interoperability, situational awareness and collaborative decision-making. By enabling actors to access and share trusted information in a harmonised way, SWIM accelerates the shift toward smarter operations, more predictable trajectories and a more resilient and sustainable network.
Designed to trigger interest and open the door for deeper exchanges at Airspace World 2026, this session highlights why digitalization is a key enabler of Europe’s ATM modernisation journey.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies

This presentation aims to give the audience an overview of FF-ICE in solid terms, intending to show, step-by-step, how ANSPs, airlines, and airports can collaborate among themselves towards the transition to FF-ICE. In this sense, this presentation will show how Atech – Embraer Group – is supporting ANSP, airlines, and airport operators in preparations for this transition

As a use case, this demonstration will be based on a system developed by Atech – an Integrated Flight Plan and Flow Management System – based on the requirements established by DECEA (Department of Airspace Control) – the Brazilian ANSP – and in live operation since 2024. This system is ready for transition to FF-ICE, starting with FF-ICE/R1, and having provision for SWIM integration, an enabler for the FF-ICE transition.

Like any worldwide ANSP, DECEA faces the challenge of providing better services to the aviation community without sacrificing the most valuable keyword in aviation: safety. Thus, this presentation will show how the collaboration among industry, ANSPs, airports, and airlines aims to produce outstanding outcomes while transitioning towards FF-ICE and complying with ICAO regulations.

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Seamless Skies for All

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) is more than just a buzzword. Instead, UAM will redefine how people and goods move through increasingly congested urban airspaces, marking a pivotal shift in the evolution of aviation. Enabled by rapid advances in electric propulsion and novel aircraft configurations, UAM promises to extend the benefits of air transportation beyond traditional airports and routes. This will bring faster, flexible and sustainable flight closer to where people live and work. What was once considered a visionary concept is now transitioning into operational reality.
As this new ecosystem takes shape, the integration of manned air shuttle operations emerges as a critical bridge between today’s conventional aviation framework and tomorrow’s highly automated air mobility networks. However, integrating air shuttles into already highly congested and restricted airspaces will require a holistic approach with all stakeholders including a thorough planning process with the ANSP, regulator and local stakeholders.
DFS Aviation Services was tasked by Munich Airport International and as part of the Air Mobility Initiative to develop procedures that would allow for the integration of eVTOLs at Munich International Airport for a pre-defined vertiport. This talk will provide firsthand insights into integrating eVTOL and air shuttle traffic into a busy airport environment. We will provide an overview of the project’s approach as well as the methodology used to integrate eVTOL operations at bespoke airport, illustrating key considerations and best practices.
We will explore the Concept of Operations (CONOPS) framework for VFR and IFR procedures, highlight the role of safety assessments and showcase how real-time simulations can support the validation of operational concepts. This session will offer a clear, implementation-oriented perspective on:

• the operational benefits of Urban Air Mobility,
• structuring an integration approach for eVTOL traffic in complex airspace, and
• the importance of strong partnerships and networks in delivering a comprehensive, future-ready solution.

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People, Skills & Next-Gen

The global air traffic control industry is at a crossroads, facing an international controller shortage perpetuated by a dependency on a manual 1-to-1 training model. For decades, simulation training has been anchored in legacy methods and technology that require constant, over-the-shoulder supervision and subjective memory. This high-touch, low-yield model is no longer viable in an era requiring rapid, standardized workforce expansion. As this constraint begins to impact global aviation safety, it is clear we must move beyond manual observation toward a more objective, technology driven training pipeline. We can’t solve today’s problems with yesterday’s approach.

In this session, Dale Drake, Vice President of Business Development at UFA, Inc. and former U.S. Air Force Chief of ATC Operations, Procedures and Training, explores how the industry can break the 1-to-1 barrier and accelerate production. Drawing on his experience managing over 100 facilities and 4,500 personnel globally, Drake introduces a paradigm shift: turning the simulation environment into a connected source of data-evidenced training rather than a series of “one-off” subjectively-assessed events.

He will introduce new force multiplier concepts and technology, including high-fidelity voice recognition analytics with automated scoring that provides students with objective / data-evidenced feedback after every run. He will also discuss how data analytics form a critical foundation for Competency-Based Training and Assessment. Finally, he will outline how new technology and methodology can empower students to practice independently, freeing master instructors to focus on high-value coaching rather than routine monitoring.

Attendees will learn how transitioning from subjective assessment to a data-aware “learner-centric” model will revolutionize training throughput.

Key Takeaways:
• How to Break the Bottleneck: Strategies to move beyond the traditional 1-to-1 instructor ratio to increase student throughput in the face of an instructor shortage crisis
• The Power of Objective Data: How automated tracking of simulated aircraft state data and voice communications eliminates instructor variability while enhancing safety
• Systemic Optimization: Using aggregated trend data to diagnose and fix systemic performance gaps in training curricula to close the feedback loop more quickly and efficiently

Join us to discover how to make ATC training as effective, data-driven, and resilient as the future aviation system it supports.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies

This 25-minute session presents a concise, forward-looking overview of the Flight Centric Air Traffic Control (ATC) concept as it approaches deployment readiness. Aimed at Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) and policy makers, the session distills years of research into clear, actionable insights relevant to both operational planning and regulatory decision-making.

Delivered by two researchers directly involved in the concept’s development, the presentation is structured in two complementary parts. The first speaker introduces the Flight Centric ATC paradigm, outlining its foundational principles, intended operational benefits, and how it differs from traditional sector-based approaches. Emphasis is placed on the motivations behind the concept and its alignment with future airspace and traffic management needs.

The second speaker focuses on the pre-deployment perspective, summarizing validation activities, key findings from simulations and the current maturity of the concept. This segment highlights implications for ANSP operations and policy frameworks, including readiness considerations, integration challenges, and next steps toward operations.

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Defence & Military

As airspace demand grows and operational complexity increases, civil-military coordination has become a critical enabler of safety, efficiency, and flexibility. Dynamic Airspace Configuration (DAC) offers a promising approach to optimize airspace usage in real time, balancing civil and military needs without compromising operational integrity.
This panel will explore how modern tools and collaborative frameworks can transform civil-military integration, drawing on lessons from SESAR projects such as MITRANO and HARMONIC. These initiatives aim to deliver advanced solutions for dynamic airspace management, enabling stakeholders to respond to evolving traffic patterns and mission requirements with agility and precision.
Key discussion angles include:
• Dynamic Airspace Configuration in practice: How DAC can improve capacity and resilience while maintaining safety.
• Civil-military collaboration models: What works, what doesn’t, and how to foster trust and transparency.
• Technological enablers: Insights from SESAR MITRANO and HARMONIC on tools and processes that support real-time decision-making.
• Operational and cultural challenges: How to align priorities across civil and military stakeholders in diverse regulatory environments.

The goal is to share experiences, identify best practices, and explore how innovation can help us achieve a truly integrated airspace that meets the needs of all users.

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Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM, Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies, Drones & UTM

Featuring key representatives from DGAC, AESA, and ENAIRE, the panel provides a comprehensive analysis of the institutional cooperation required to harmonize manned and unmanned traffic. Participants will gain firsthand insights into Spain’s transition from strategic framework to the real-world deployment of U-space.
This panel examines the new National Action Plan for U-space and Geozones Deployment (PANDU+) led by DGAC, outlining the strategic roadmap for safe UAS integration and scaling operations. The discussion focuses on the critical regulatory and technical challenges of certifying Common Information Service Providers (CISP) and U-space Service Providers (USSP) under AESA’s oversight. Furthermore, the session explores ENAIRE’s operational milestones in implementing Spain’s inaugural U-space volume.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies

The US is embarking on one of the most significant air traffic surveillance modernization programs ever seen. Under a newly awarded contract, RTX and Indra will replace more than 600 ground-based radars with modern, high performance surveillance systems by 2028. This nationwide renewal aims to strengthen safety, improve operational efficiency, and simplify system maintenance by consolidating the many radar configurations currently in use.

The award supports the FAA’s broader Brand-New Air Traffic Control System (BNATCS) initiative to modernize the National Airspace System (NAS), replacing aging infrastructure with modern, resilient, and cyber-secure technology.

This panel will explore how this substantial investment is reshaping the country’s surveillance infrastructure, how such a largescale project is handled from a manufacturer point-of-view, and what it means for the future of air traffic management.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies

The EURIALO project, supported by the European Space Agency (ESA), is advancing a new space-based surveillance layer designed to strengthen the resilience and continuity of Air Traffic Management (ATM). Building on its introduction at previous editions of Airspace World, this presentation focuses on EURIALO’s progress toward operational maturity and its role in complementing existing terrestrial surveillance infrastructures.
By leveraging a micro-satellite constellation and advanced multilateration (MLAT) techniques, EURIALO enhances global surveillance coverage, including in remote or interference-prone environments. Fully aligned with SESAR priorities and the European ATM Master Plan, and covered by CNS evolution MP, the project delivers tangible benefits in safety, operational performance, and sustainability. Developed by a consortium including Spire, Thales, ESSP, and ENAV, EURIALO is currently in its In-Orbit Demonstration phase, marking a key milestone on the path to operational space-based surveillance services.

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Policy, Regulation & Governance, Defence & Military, Drones & UTM

In 2022, the EU Drone Strategy 2.0 set out the EU’s vision for integrating drones into Europe’s airspace and economy by 2030. Nearly halfway to that horizon, Europe’s lower skies remain largely empty, and drone operations are still far from being part of citizens’ everyday lives. What we do see, however, are drone incursions over airports and other critical infrastructure – disrupting travel, harming businesses, and raising serious security concerns.

Against this backdrop, and in light of the forthcoming review of the EU Drone Strategy, this session will examine where the strategy has delivered and where it needs rethinking; where implementation is gaining traction and where progress must accelerate; what the European Commission is planning next; and what both industry and society expect from an ambitious Drone Strategy.

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Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies, Seamless Skies for All

Europe’s air traffic network is under increasing pressure as demand for airspace capacity continues to grow and operational complexity rises. In this panel discussion participants will share their perspectives on the current air traffic situation and its challenges, how to optimise operations, manage capacity, and create efficiencies while ensuring safe air traffic operations – especially in light of peak traffic for Summer 2026. The discussion will also explore how efficient air traffic control resources, cross-border design solutions, air-ground integration, open digital infrastructure, and seamless airspace organisation can help optimise existing capacity while preparing for future traffic growth.

Moderated by Iacopo Prissinotti, Director Network Management at EUROCONTROL, the discussion will feature insights from Peggy Devestel, Director of the EUROCONTROL Maastricht Upper Area Control Centre (MUAC) and from panellists representing air navigation service providers (ANSP), aircraft operators and airports.

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Drones & UTM

The moderator will provide an overview of the AAM ecosystem and state of the art. The speakers will outline the progresses achieved in Advanced Air Mobility in the fields of eVTOLs, Vertiports and operators. Eve will outline the last milestones for Vector UATM and Eve eVTOL flight trials. Aerosolutions will provide the operator/airline angle with a example of previewed routes for Costa Rica Pacific coast. Bluenest will explain the last vertiport control trials for medical services in Balearic and Canary Islands and the interest to deploy a vertiport network in Costa Rica.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies

Digitalisation has already transformed many sectors, improving efficiency, connectivity, and decision-making. In air traffic management, similar benefits are increasingly within reach—but only if digital technologies and collaboration evolve together. Rather than being separate enablers, digitalisation and collaboration are mutually reinforcing: digital platforms can make collaboration easier, faster, and more scalable, while effective collaboration helps unlock the full value of digital solutions.
This panel will explore how digital technology can actively support regional collaboration in the Asia-Pacific region. It will begin with an overview of the Regional Collaboration Platform developed by AIR Lab—an open, cloud-based sandbox with built-in tools and representative data that enables multiple stakeholders to test new operational concepts and scenarios in a collaborative environment.
Building on this example, APAC ANSPs will share how they are using the platform in practice, lessons learned so far, and potential new use cases. The discussion will then broaden to examine what other digital tools, platforms, or approaches could further enhance collaboration across the region, and how such initiatives can support more integrated, resilient, and future-ready ATM operations.

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People, Skills & Next-Gen

Airways New Zealand has sustained an average ATC training success rate of around 95% over the past 12 years – nearly double the industry norm – through a systematic combination of data-driven selection, world-class competency-based training, and advanced simulation technologies. In this session, we will reveal how Airways International’s proven methodology is helping ANSPs worldwide to transform their training outcomes.
While air traffic controller shortages intensify globally and training failure rates commonly reach 50% in many regions, the cost of getting selection and training wrong has never been higher. Candidates invest months before discovering they won’t succeed, and ANSPs lose substantial resources without filling critical positions.
Airways International, the ANSP’s commercial arm has developed this world-leading approach to transform ATC training outcomes – an approach grounded in organisational psychology, 30 years of training experience and innovative use of technology.
Through rigorous and proven selection tools used by ANSPs and over 50,000 candidates worldwide, highly realistic simulation environments, and globally recognised ATC training with world-class instructors – Airways International has developed a replicable model that significantly reduces training failures.
This session explores the key elements of Airways’ selection and training strategy, shares practical insights from implementation with ANSPs globally, and demonstrates how evidence-based approaches can deliver measurable improvements in training success rates while reducing time and cost.

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People, Skills & Next-Gen

The future of aviation depends not only on technology, but on people. This panel explores how organisations across the ecosystem are addressing talent attraction, retention, and skills development while creating space for startups and new entrants to grow.

Through real-world examples, speakers will share initiatives that are delivering results today — offering practical insights the audience can adapt to their own organisations.

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Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM

Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) aim to deliver sufficient capacity for airline customers and airspace users. But, as demand increases and system flexibility decreases, even minor disruptions risk escalating across the network. It’s clear that building resilience alongside capacity is essential to contain issues and ensure safe recovery, which raises the question: are current investments in resilience and continuity adequate?

ANSPs evaluate the risks, costs, and advantages differently, striving to strike a balance between investing in business continuity and addressing other organisational priorities. However, the costs of disruption can extend beyond individual service providers, impacting on their stakeholders and the flying public, and therefore the potential benefits of investment in business continuity improvements can be under-represented.

This presentation focuses on how ANSPs can deliver a resilient service and enhance their business continuity provision. Should they take the gamble that their systems won’t fail, or invest in their business continuity capability?

Why this session is important
• Resilience is a strategic imperative: disruptions in ATM and airport operations can have severe economic and social consequences
• Major disruptions occur more frequently today (weather conditions, social actions, system and software outages)
• It is relevant for all stakeholders: from global hubs influencing GDP to small airports serving isolated communities

Key takeaways for the audience
• Understand the true cost of disruption and balance risk and investment.
• Discover practical solutions: review examples of resilience strategies tailored to different airport scales and contexts.
• Explore real-world examples from major hubs and regional airfields, illustrating both the impact of disruptions and potential continuity solutions.

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Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM, Innovation to Enable Future Skies

The session will describe the successful activation of the remote TWR Control Center, focusing on technical aspects, expected benefits, and the remote control plan for the 26 towers included in the project.

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People, Skills & Next-Gen

For more than three decades, ATC training has trended toward ever-higher fidelity, full-immersion simulation – often under the assumption that realism automatically delivers better learning outcomes. Research and operational evidence suggest otherwise.
This session challenges the “more fidelity equals better training” assumption and presents a practical, evidence-based approach for integrating low-fidelity part-task training into modern ATCO curricula to improve learning efficiency, skill acquisition, and operational readiness.

Drawing on learning science, operational experience, and the Proficiency Cycle training model, this presentation demonstrates how foundational cognitive, psychomotor, and procedural skills – such as scan discipline and radio telephony – are more effectively acquired and consolidated in low-pressure, repeatable environments before being assessed in high-fidelity simulators.
Attendees will explore how structured use of part-task trainers, adaptive learning tools, integrated analytics and gamification can reduce training costs, increase throughput, and improve performance in high-pressure simulation and live operations, all without compromising safety or standards.

The session offers actionable insights for ANSPs, training organisations, and regulators seeking scalable, future-ready ATC training systems.

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Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies

The Air Traffic Complexity Support Tool provides real-time and predictive assessment of traffic complexity across airspace and airport environments. By combining surveillance data, flight trajectories, weather, and operational constraints, the tool generates dynamic complexity indicators that go beyond traffic volume alone.
These indicators support controllers, flow managers, and planners in anticipating workload, optimizing sector configurations, and enabling demand–capacity balancing strategies that reduce delays, fuel burn, and emissions. By proactively managing complexity rather than reacting to congestion, the tool enhances safety, improves operational efficiency, and contributes to more sustainable and environmentally responsible air traffic operations.

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Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM

GNSS interference in the European airspace has increased dramatically. Reports of GPS disruption rose over 400% between 2022 and 2024, with Eastern Europe experiencing particularly sustained interference. When aircraft leave GPS spoofing zones, the interference stops, but in many cases, the navigation system doesn’t immediately recover, and residual effects can persist. We call this the “GPS Hangover,” and it’s a bigger issue than previously recognized.

Spoofing differs from jamming in a critical way: it provides false position data that appears valid and passes standard integrity checks without triggering alerts. While jamming accounts for roughly 80% of reported GNSS interference incidents, spoofing presents disproportionate operational challenges because even when crews recognize the issue, they often have few immediate options beyond turning off the impacted systems. Moreover, systems may not recover until reset on the ground.

Monitoring the situation with European ANSPs for more than 4 years, SeRo Systems has observed and documented thousands of cases where spoofed GPS leads aircraft to report ADS-B positions tens of nautical miles off for hours after leaving interference zones. In high-interference regions, extended exposure periods can corrupt the internal state of the GPS receiver of some aircraft, for example, by downloading false ephemeris data. As a result, essential parts of the avionics remain affected until the avionics components are reset on the ground.

The consequence is that interference in one location can affect operations hundreds of kilometers away. To combat this problem, EASA has called for enhanced GNSS monitoring capabilities and operator awareness programs, while ICAO recommends developing comprehensive PNT resilience strategies and implementing robust interference detection systems. Both organizations emphasize the critical need for coordinated monitoring efforts and systematic reporting mechanisms across ANSPs, operators, and regulatory bodies.

Using operational monitoring data through 2025, we’ll examine how these carryover effects manifest in the European airspace. We’ll share monitoring architectures deployed in high-interference environments that provide ANSPs with actionable operational intelligence beyond basic pilot reporting. The session also offers practical insights into what sustained GNSS interference means for European airspace and what monitoring capabilities can help ANSPs support safer operations.

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Policy, Regulation & Governance, People, Skills & Next-Gen, Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM

As aviation systems become increasingly advanced, many safety frameworks continue to perform as designed, yet incidents still occur. This session explores how human performance operates as a system variable within safety-critical environments, and how factors such as cognitive load, staffing models, and operational complexity can converge to create risk. Drawing on recent industry patterns, the session offers a system-level perspective on how organisations can better identify, manage, and mitigate these risks.

Key takeaways:
Why human error is often the final symptom, not the root cause
How cognitive load, fatigue, and staffing structures influence real-time decision-making
The role of system visibility and coordination gaps in operational risk
Practical considerations for strengthening system-level safeguards across ATM and operational environments

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Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies, Innovation to Enable Future Skies, Seamless Skies for All

Innovation in Air Traffic Management is defined by how effectively we share information. This talk highlights LEONARDO’s recent milestone in validating OLDI modernization over SWIM Yellow Profile within the SESAR framework, in collaboration with EUROCONTROL, BULATSA and ROMATSA, with cross-border connectivity to Türkiye.
This solution provides a standardized, high-performance environment for real-time data exchange with sub-second data sharing across EUROCONTROL and three ANSPs. It demonstrates a practical first step toward Network TBO, supporting the SESAR Deployment Manager, EUROCONTROL’s Network Strategy, and 4D Trajectory vision, while paving the way for more advanced trajectory-driven operations in a digitalized European airspace.

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Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM

Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) interference has moved from a sporadic anomaly to a systemic operational risk for global aviation. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), International Air Transport Association (IATA), International Federation of Air Line Pilots’ Associations (IFALPA), European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and EUROCONTROL (European Organisation for the Safety of Air Navigation) now identify GNSS disruption as a top-tier safety and resilience concern. Industry analysis, such as that published by OPSGROUP (International Flight Operations organisation), reports a multi-fold increases in aviation GNSS interference events since 2022. In several regions, aircraft experience GNSS degradation, corruption, or complete loss on a near-daily basis, affecting en-route, terminal, and airport surface operations.

Airlines and Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) report frequent loss of Required Navigation Performance (RNP) capability, intermittent or complete loss of GNSS-based surveillance, increased flight crew workload, and reduced operational predictability, particularly during periods of elevated geopolitical tension. OPSGROUP and other industry analyses also highlight that many events remain under-reported or inconsistently classified, limiting the ability of regulators, ANSPs, and operators to assess true exposure, trend severity, or justify mitigations. Airports, heliports, and emerging drone and Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) operations face an even greater challenge, with increasing dependence on GNSS-based procedures and little or no continuous radio-frequency spectrum monitoring.

This presentation demonstrates how CGI addresses this gap through a global network of hundreds of continuously operating GNSS monitoring sensors, delivering persistent, aircraft-independent measurement of interference strength, duration, frequency, and geographic extent using CGI SignalSense. Unlike pilot reports or aircraft-only data, SignalSense provides 24/7 situational awareness, including when aircraft are not flying, enabling objective severity scoring, trend analysis, and historical evidence aligned with ICAO Annex 10 (Aeronautical Telecommunications), Performance-Based Navigation (PBN) guidance, and resilient Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT) frameworks. CGI SignalSense therefore provides enhanced situational awareness beyond conventional Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast (ADS-B) monitoring maps as performance is provided in locations where aircraft are not flying and can attribute the source to suitable accuracy inform international response to sustained jamming or spoofing impacting the Aerospace sector.

The session also introduces a CGI Android-based GNSS interference detection application designed for airline or airport use. Deployed on commercial off-the-shelf mobile devices which can be carried on board, the application passively detects and characterises GNSS jamming and spoofing effects experienced by the aircraft, providing time-stamped, indications of disruption. When correlated with fixed point SignalSense monitoring, this aircraft-side evidence helps airlines and ANSPs distinguish localised cockpit effects from wider-area interference, improving event classification, operational awareness, and post-event analysis, without interfacing with certified avionics.

CGI will further outline how objective monitoring data supports earlier pilot warning and decision-making, as well as resilient navigation strategies. This includes the safe and informed use of emerging alternative navigation (Alt-Nav) methods, such as visual-based navigation / terrain feature map matching, inertial augmentation, and emerging Low Earth Orbit (LEO)-based PNT services, by clearly characterising when GNSS is degraded, denied, or unreliable.

Attendees will see how this data:

• Complements pilot reports and crew observations with objective, aircraft-independent and aircraft-side GNSS interference evidence
• Combines fixed monitoring networks and mobile detection tools to improve event detection, classification, and operational confidence
• Supports ANSP tactical and strategic decision-making, including procedure design, contingency planning, and managed degradation of PBN operations
• Informs airline operational risk assessments, Operations Control Centre (OCC) decision-making, route planning, and crew guidance during GNSS disruption
• Provides objective inputs to support the adoption of alternative navigation methods by defining when GNSS-based navigation can no longer be relied upon and when validated alternatives may be appropriate
• Integrates with Electronic Flight Bag (EFB) and OCC workflows, enabling consistent situational awareness across flight crews, dispatch, and operations
• Can be deployed at airports, heliports, and drone ports to strengthen crewed and uncrewed aviation operations in GNSS-degraded environments

Why attend:
This session positions GNSS interference monitoring not as a technical curiosity, but as a foundational resilience aerospace capability, providing the evidence needed to manage GNSS disruption, enable alternative navigation methods responsibly, and transform fragmented reports into actionable intelligence and operational continuity.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies, Drones & UTM

Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) encompasses a range of technological changes that are transforming aviation. The scale, range, and altitude of AAM operations imply that weather will play differently to its role in conventional aviation as there will be increased impacts from dynamic conditions in the planetary boundary layer. Therefore, there is the need for additional weather sensing and higher resolution weather models to be integrated with advanced decision support technologies. This joint presentation between MIT Lincoln Laboratory and SkyGrid will discuss how high resolution weather forecast (HRF) models can be used for AAM operation planning. Moreover, some progress towards identifying industry-specific weather requirements for AAM operations leveraging high-resolution models will be presented.

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Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM

This session will present a project focused on the implementation of the Model-Based Safety Analysis (MBSA) methodology for Air Traffic Management (ATM) safety studies, leveraging the SimfiaNeo tool. We will showcase a demonstrator model developed for an ATM system within the tool.

The core advantage of this approach lies in SimfiaNeo’s ability to perform an in-depth analysis of the system and the propagation of failures within it. The traditional methodology relies on fault trees, requiring the safety engineer to manually imagine all potential failure scenarios. This manual process is inherently time-consuming and error-prone. Conversely, SimfiaNeo exhaustively and automatically analyzes all failure propagation paths that can lead to a failure condition.

Furthermore, MBSA and SimfiaNeo provide benefits that extend beyond mere time and cost efficiency. By being integrated with the design, the safety model provides a more concrete approach than a classic fault tree. This proximity to the system design significantly facilitates exchanges with both design teams and operational personnel, which in turn accelerates system adoption and technical discussions. The model itself therefore becomes a powerful presentation and communication support tool.

The objective is to highlight and showcase the significant advantages of this approach and the specific gains offered by a dedicated tool like SimfiaNeo in ATM safety assessments, leading to improvements in both rigor and efficiency.

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Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies, Seamless Skies for All, Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM

As Europe accelerates its journey toward a smarter, more sustainable and more interoperable air traffic management system, the implementation of Common Project 1 (CP1) stands at a decisive moment.
In this session, the SESAR Deployment Manager will unpack how CP1 deployment is already shaping operational performance across the continent—enhancing predictability, supporting greener trajectories, and reinforcing network resilience—while offering a forward-looking view of what comes next.
This session will give ATM professionals a clear, compelling picture of the tangible value CP1 brings to European aviation. Attendees will gain insights into lessons learned, opportunities emerging from synchronised implementation, and the strategic role CP1 plays in Europe’s broader digitalisation and decarbonisation ambitions.
Designed to spark dialogue and prepare the ground for deeper exchanges throughout Airspace World 2026, this session provides an essential update for anyone involved in shaping the future of European ATM.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies

For decades, critical airside and air traffic management operations have relied on legacy technologies that delivered reliability—but at a significant cost. Data became fragmented, interoperability was limited, and both airports and ANSPs grew increasingly dependent on a small number of vendors. As operational needs evolved, change was often slow, complex, and expensive—constrained more by architectural rigidity than by operational ambition.
Today, the industry is once again in a period of transformation. Digitalisation, automation, and data-driven operations are central to future performance. “Platforms” are widely promoted as the solution. Yet many proprietary platforms risk recreating the same structural limitations of the past, this time with modern interfaces and new terminology.
In this joint session, NATS and Searidge share how the UK’s ANSP has adopted an open, platform-based ATM architecture to break this cycle. The speakers will explain why legacy approaches are no longer sufficient, what is driving the move to an open platform model, and how this shift is enabling greater flexibility, resilience, and innovation.
Using real-world examples, the session will demonstrate how a shared digital foundation supports faster deployment, improved situational awareness, and new operational services.
Attendees will gain practical insight into what defines a strong ATM platform, why ANSPs should own their foundational architecture, and how this approach supports NATS’ long-term vision for future UK tower operations.

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People, Skills & Next-Gen

Digitalisation promises measurable gains in safety, efficiency, and lifecycle traceability across Air Traffic Management (ATM), particularly in the Communication Navigation Surveillance (CNS) domain. Yet the transition from analogue to digital—preceded by decades of digitisation—has also introduced an unintentional capability gap in the CNS technical workforce.
While modern systems deliver higher reliability, signal processing performance, and comprehensive Built In Test Equipment (BITE), sensor embedded monitoring alone cannot assure performance across the full coverage volume or under varying environmental conditions.
This discussion highlights the need for a harmonised, measurement driven approach that couples organisation wide digitalisation with independent performance monitoring, standardized methodologies, and renewed fundamentals based training. Drawing on operational practice and standards (e.g., ICAO Doc 8071 and ATSEP guidance), we show how global statistics (e.g., Pd and azimuth bias) can mask local performance shortfalls that directly affect separation minima. We outline a framework that integrates unified measurement and analysis toolsets from product qualification, factory testing, commissioning and through life monitoring, with centralized, time stamped data for traceability, multi-stakeholder support, and a proactive and predictive maintenance regime.
Case examples using Intersoft Electronics Surveillance Monitoring System (SMS) and Radar Analysis Support System (RASS) illustrate how sensor systems, including legacy, can be performance tracked and re-baselined to meet modern performance targets, and how emerging techniques (e.g., drone based measurements) can accelerate compliance while reducing cost.
For the industry, a standardised measurement and enhanced training framework—aligned to international standards—can strengthen safety assurance, restore and uplift knowledge, and ensure that digitalisation enhances, rather than further erodes, CNS technical expertise.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies, Seamless Skies for All

Aireon will present updates to its strategic plan and assessments for Space-Based VHF. Aireon currently operates the only continuously global and safety-certified Space-Based ADS-B service that integrates with over 25 CANSO ANSPs. Leveraging this experience and its partnership with Iridium, Aireon seeks to expand its offerings to include VHF services in its next satellite constellation. Additionally, Aireon will describe the safety approach that was applied similarly to its current EASA certification. This presentation will include Aireon’s global perspective on the analysis and planning it has conducted for SB-VHF and continue to gather inputs from the community on the approach.

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People, Skills & Next-Gen, Innovation to Enable Future Skies

Technology is aggressively redefining the boundaries of what can be built and operated within Air Traffic Management (ATM) software and services. We are witnessing a fundamental paradigm shift: while humans have traditionally built and operated systems with machines serving as passive verifiers, a new era is emerging. In this model, Generative AI (GenAI) and automated systems take on the heavy lifting of production and operations, empowering human experts to ascend to a higher-level role: controlling and optimizing system-wide performance.
The core of this is simple yet transformative: The more machines operate, the more humans can elevate performance.
This shift raises critical questions for the industry:
Autonomous Production: Can GenAI autonomously translate complex requirements into natural language into prototypes, components, and ready-to-use ATC system code?
Certification & Standards: What new certification frameworks are required to validate AI-generated code in a safety-critical environment and to be securely deployed in cloud infrastructure?
Sovereignty: How can we leverage generic European technology, control depedencies and institutional guarantees to fulfill certification requirements at a lower cost and within a shorter timeframe?
This talk explores the value of “technology-driven crafting.” With Cloud, AI, and data architectures reaching maturity, the capability to accelerate ATM modernization through GenAI-produced code is no longer a theoretical exercise—it is a matter of adoption and integration at scale. We will discuss how moving toward open architectures and AI-driven code production creates a human-centric service orientation that is faster, more resilient, and ready for the next generation of airspace.

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Policy, Regulation & Governance, People, Skills & Next-Gen, Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies, Innovation to Enable Future Skies, Seamless Skies for All, Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM

The Center for Air Transportation Resilience (CATRes), a NASA University Leadership Initiative, conducts data-driven research to strengthen the resilience of the air transportation system. CATRes is led by academic researchers from University of California, Berkeley; University of Michigan; University of Pennsylvania; and the University of Maryland, in close collaboration with industry partners (airlines, airport authorities) and the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). This presentation provides a technical overview of ongoing CATRes research, including cluster analyses of historical disruptions, generative models for synthetic disruption training, and airline–air traffic collaborative optimization. Now in its second year, CATRes has made substantial technical progress; we will dive deep into results most relevant to airline operations and system resilience.

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Innovation to Enable Future Skies

Made up of key players, including OEM’s, air traffic managers, UTM/U-space solution providers and vertiport developers, this expert panel will reveal how data, common interfaces and aligned architecture enables operational models that are key to enabling safe automation and reliable performance, while creating a compelling commercial business case to attract investors.

The session will cover how digital ATM capabilities currently make airspace safer and more efficient and explore how the use of dynamic airspace and network management, real-time deconfliction can aid high intensity operations, enabling the lower airspace economy.

Attendees will learn how data and collaboration are key to unlocking faster growth for AAM, building confidence for regulators, creating opportunities for investors.

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Policy, Regulation & Governance, Innovation to Enable Future Skies, Drones & UTM

As airspace systems evolve to accommodate drones, advanced air mobility and increasingly diverse aviation activity, traditional approaches to airspace safety and access are reaching their limits. Regulatory and operational decisions are often still based on qualitative judgement and static classifications, limiting the ability to assess risk consistently, transparently and at scale.

This joint presentation by the Queensland University of Technology (QUT), its project partners (Boeing and FlyFreely), and Aireon presents a data-driven framework that enables airspace collision risk to be assessed in a consistent, repeatable and operationally meaningful way across national airspace systems. Developed through the government-funded Australian Digital Airspace Characterisation (ADAC) project and based on more than four years of development, the approach represents a shift from descriptive airspace categorisation to quantified, spatially resolved risk assessment.

At the core of the framework are data-driven and data-informed probabilistic collision risk models for regions with good and limited surveillance coverage, respectively. Collision risk is quantified at fine spatial and temporal scales using a combination of established and novel aviation risk modelling techniques, innovative data management approaches, and high-performance computing. Risk metrics are visualised using standard geographic information systems and custom online applications, in a manner that is interpretable and customisable for regulatory, operational and policy decision-making. Crucially, this approach provides a bridge between quantitative analysis and qualitative judgement, supporting defensible, evidence-based and unbiased risk categorisation across most airspace environments.

The presentation will highlight the unique and distinguishing features of these models compared to existing approaches, before focusing on national-scale results and real-world case study applications with additional partners. It will demonstrate how robust, quantitative, high-resolution risk models can support a wide range of applications for uncrewed aviation (for example, risk-based assessments and approvals), crewed aviation (such as airspace change assessment, safety intervention prioritisation and evaluation of emerging operational concepts), as well as policy and regulatory development.

This collaboration illustrates how research capability and operational surveillance infrastructure can be combined to move from analysis to implementation at high technology readiness levels. While demonstrated in an Australian context, the underlying framework is jurisdiction-agnostic and can be adapted to other national and regional airspace systems by adjusting data inputs, thresholds and governance settings.

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Seamless Skies for All, Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies

Severe weather and capacity constraints have long been major disruptors for Europe’s air traffic network, but new solutions are changing the game. Yolanda Portillo, Head of the EUROCONTROL Network Manager Operations Centre will share insights on how the EUROCONTROL Network Manager – together with aviation partners – has introduced innovative capacity and weather-based procedures that significantly improved operational stability and performance in Summer 2025. Pre-agreed rerouting scenarios applied under the scope of a well-established Cooperative Decision-Making (CDM) process have become a key enabler for safe, efficient, and predictable operations across the network. By limiting last-minute changes and reducing volatility, this stable operational framework allows both airspace users and service providers to plan with greater confidence and to optimise the use of available capacity, resulting in cutting en-route delays by 31% and slashing weather-related delays by an impressive 41% compared to the previous summer. The presentation will also include an update on the evolution of the procedures for summer 2026.

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Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies

The session will develop the evaluation of operational mitigation options for Contrails and non-CO2 emissions reduction.
The CICONIA project is arriving to an end in 2026, this session will provide insight of evaluation exercises and trials.

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Other

Doc 4444 was designed to provide globally harmonized procedures, and in many respects it does that very well. However, wake turbulence is treated in a relatively contained and time-based way, reflecting the operational environment and knowledge available when those provisions were developed.

Today’s airspace looks very different. We have denser traffic, mixed aircraft performance, enhanced surveillance, and a much better understanding of wake vortex behaviour. As a result, many States now manage wake turbulence as a dynamic operational hazard, rather than purely as a separation minimum.

The question, then, is not whether Doc 4444 is wrong, but whether its wake turbulence provisions still reflect how wake turbulence is actually managed in modern airspace, and whether they should evolve to better support contemporary operations.

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Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM, Collaborative Operations for Sustainable Skies

The Data4Safety initiative, led by EASA, continues to transform aviation safety across Europe by setting new benchmarks in collaborative, data‑driven safety intelligence. This ambitious programme unites Member States (National Aviation Authorities) and industry stakeholders—air operators, ATM organisations, aircraft manufacturers, and now more actively Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs)—in an unprecedented effort to identify and mitigate systemic safety risks. Through advanced analytics and large‑scale data integration, Data4Safety enables the aviation sector to take a proactive, intelligence‑led approach to strengthening safety performance.
At the heart of this initiative lies a cutting‑edge data platform developed by Paradigma Digital and ALG. Engineered to process over 500 terabytes of diverse aviation data, the platform leverages state‑of‑the‑art cloud technologies to deliver advanced analytics, predictive safety models, and systemic risk detection capabilities. This modern infrastructure underpins safety benchmarking, vulnerability assessment, and in‑depth studies, generating actionable insights that support decision‑making across all segments of the industry.
This year, the programme expands its impact through deeper collaboration with ANSPs, whose operational expertise provides critical context for understanding real‑world risk dynamics in European airspace. By contributing their data, perspective, and domain knowledge, ANSPs help enhance the granularity and operational relevance of Data4Safety insights—closing the loop between safety intelligence and day‑to‑day traffic management practices.

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People, Skills & Next-Gen, Safety, Security & Resilience in ATM, Seamless Skies for All, Innovation to Enable Future Skies

Air traffic controllers have long operated at the limits of human cognitive performance through simultaneously managing separation assurance, trajectory anticipation, traffic sequencing, inter-sector coordination, and time-critical decision-making under uncertainty. While artificial intelligence has transformed many areas of aviation, its benefits have yet to be consistently realized in everyday air traffic management operations.
This session will demonstrate how that gap can be closed by positioning AI as practical decision support rather than as a replacement for human expertise. The focus is on AI capabilities designed to reduce cognitive load, enhance situational awareness, and support controllers incrementally within existing workflows. Emphasis is placed on solutions that are operationally validated, transparent, and scalable beyond a limited number of high-investment initiatives.
The session will highlight concrete operational applications, including earlier conflict prediction with actionable resolution options, improved demand–capacity balancing and sector load forecasting, smarter AMAN/DMAN sequencing to reduce delays, and trajectory and route optimization to lower fuel burn and CO₂ emissions. Additional use cases include anomaly detection to strengthen safety nets and digital-twin simulations to support controller training and procedural validation. The lessons learned while coding and developing AI and LLM–based capabilities for air traffic management automation systems will also be shared in this session.
The central message is clear: when AI delivers measurable, usable, and trustworthy capability directly within the controller’s workflow, it becomes a genuine operational enabler for the ATC community.

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