KARACHI: The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) will spend $9.6 million to purchase a new radar system from a Spanish company in order to upgrade its system to ensure better air safety and navigation.

CAA Deputy Director General Air Vice Marshal Khawar Hussain told journalists on Monday after the contract-signing ceremony that in the first phase the primary and secondary radars at the Jinnah International Airport, Karachi, and the Allama Iqbal International Airport, Lahore, would be replaced and later radars at other airports of the country would be changed.

The agreement was signed by Mr Hussain and Spanish company Indra’s Vice President Farancisco Navarro.

AVM Hussain said that new radars would be put in place in the next 18 months to replace the old ones that were installed around a couple of decades ago.

He said that with the purchase and installation of new radars the number of aircraft using the Pakistani air space would be doubled as the new and more sophisticated equipment would help reduce the distance among the aircraft, thereby accommodating and guiding more planes at one time in the country’s airspace.
Newspaper.National:LatestNews He said that besides providing more air safety the new radar system would help increase the CIA revenues in the form of its fees which was a major source of the Authority’s revenue in foreign exchange. With the new system, he said, the CAA would be able to provide navigational facilities to more aircraft flying through Pakistan and using its airspace which in turn would bring more revenue to the CAA.

He said that in the next three years the CAA’s entire communication, navigation and surveillance systems would be upgraded.

“Some of these systems are Natio­nwide Online Connectivity, Controller Pilot Data Link Communication, Automatic Dependent Surveillance Contract and Broadcast, Instrument Landing System, Distance Measuring System and Digital Airport Terminal Information System etc,” he said.

Published in Dawn December 23th , 2014