Located about 40 kilometres from the present airport at Don Muang and spread over about 8,000 acres, Suvarnabhumi Airport has aims of being a civil aviation hub in Southeast Asia, and is expected to deal with up to 100 million passengers and 6.4 million tonnes of cargo annually when using its full capacity in a few years' time.

The government hopes that it will have been officially opened to commercial flights by September.

Sanguan Treejareonwiwat, chief operating officer for government supplies at Samart Corporation, which leads the airport systems integration specialists' (ASIS) consortium planning the airport information management system (AIMS), said that the New Bangkok International Airport is now going through operational readiness trials, testing all its 45 sub-systems.

AIMS systems manage data and information relating to operational management, including planning, scheduling and the allocation of facilities and utilities, based upon master flight schedules.

AIMS' major sub-systems include the flight information management system (FIMS), passenger processing, airport back-office sub-systems, an operations centre, a central monitoring system and the CCTV system.

The FIMS takes care of resource allocation: the gate management system (gate/stand/check-in/baggage belt), flight/ baggage information display systems, the baggage handling system, and government sub-systems as well as other sub-systems such as concessions and cargo. Passenger processing consists of the common user terminal equipment (CUTE), baggage reconciliation system and the local departure control system.

The check-in system is working as a front office and it is provided by SITA. It is to support communication protocols, whilst linking the local departure control system with the baggage reconciliation system.

SITA's common user terminal equipment (CUTE) system offers end-to-end connectivity from host to the airport desktop, providing airlines with access to their own systems on an open industry platform.

It includes the flight information system. "The CUTE system helps an airport simplify travel and transport by speeding up passenger check-ins and making the most of limited resources," said Saguan. Airport back-office sub-systems are for administrative control, with automated data workflow and synchronisation, and to support enterprise resource planning and management.

"These functions are in the airport management database," said Saguan.

An airport operations centre looks after event-handling, situation coordination and facility inspection; a security control centre is tasked with CCTV monitoring and access control; a crisis control centre deals with emergencies. The central monitoring system is for the building automation system, fire detection and alarm system, control access and the security system, and supervisory control and data acquisition.

It is also supposed to provide graphic displays of operational events besides providing resource information with location and liaison with various airport systems meant for gathering information. CCTVs do their usual job.

Boarding passes at the airport will not use magnetic stripes. They will switch to the 2D barcode as an economy measure. RFID chips are to be embedded in passengers' baggage tags for accuracy and faster handling. The ICAO is working to hit upon a common frequency for all airlines.

"Things are progressing satisfactorily enough," said Saguan.

asina@nationgroup.com

Asina Pornwasin

The Nation