Long before The Junction was founded, we have supplied OEMs and system integrators with synchronous serial boards for Air Traffic Control (ATC) for more than three decades. Product has been deployed in air traffic control towers at airports of all sizes in nearly every region of the world.

This has consisted of serial asynchronous and serial synchronous PC boards, as well as hardware and software. These include highly specialized products such as Media Switches for Controls, Alarms and Telesignals, Serial Hubs, Converters, ATC Routers, all capable of handling the special protocols and remote control functions performed via FTP, Web servers, SNMP and proprietary NMS that are all part of the everyday life of a Control Tower. Safety in the air is paramount.

An air traffic controller’s job carriers with it a burden of great responsibility for lives and property. Thanks to the highly disciplined ATC environment, accidents and near incidents involving aircraft are fortunately very rare. But when they occur, it is important to be able to document the event so that authorities can learn from the errors. Until quite recently it was an arduous challenge to try to piece together the minutes just before and after an event. However, new technology now allows recording “at-the-glass” in millisecond detail. The data collected from one or more controller workstations, and optionally the ambient noise, can be replayed for training purposes or presented at a tribunal.