VIPMobile Air Traffic Control (ATC) Tactical Briefcase

Current air traffic control (ATC) tactical operations require disparate pieces of software and hardware equipment that fail to provide the combat controller (CCT) or the pilot with network-centric real time information. The combat controller does not have a single unified graphical view of the area of operations (AO) that would allow him to make quicker, accurate decisions. This requires both the CCT and pilot to envision a "mental picture" of the AO. The CCT must use multiple pieces of gear, which include a laptop, radios, lazing device, lights, and GPS. Scalability is dependent on the number of combat controllers who can carry all the ATC gear. VIPMobile will develop a highly integrated network-centric, software/hardware solution that will provide the combat controller with up-to-date situational awareness to allow optimal information transfer, improved decision-making, and succinct communications between the CCT and pilot. The VIPMobile Integrated Software Visualization (VIP ISV) package combines VIPMobile's existing visualization and interactive GUI software and Georgia Tech's FalconView to create a single unified combat controller interface with multiple selectable dynamic layers that can be customized for mission type and data availability. The innovation is in the ability to dynamically register and update these layers and will be one of the key technical deliverables of this project.