The National Air Traffic Service's (NATS) air traffic control
system at Swanwick is suffering software problems, which could mean
more delays for the troubled project.
The latest problem affects the Workstation Display Manager (WDM)
software. This system is responsible for drawing radar displays and
presenting information to flight controllers.
Contractors who were recently laid off from the project claim the
system is showing "cracks" and may miss its much revised launch
date in January.
One of the sacked contractors told CW360.com:"In the latest tests,
as the radar moves, it drags bits of the screen with it so the
background goes blurry. After an hour you can't see anything at
all," said the contractor, who asked not to be named.
NATS has battled with several political and technical problems in
the past and has been forced to push the system's launch date back
several times since the early 1990s. The agency denies this latest
revelation is a problem and insists the system will go live on
January 27, 2002 as planned.
"I'm happy to tell you that Swanwick remains on schedule and that
NATS and the Civil Aviation Authority, its regulators, are
satisfied with the radar screens," NATS spokesperson Richard Wright
told CW360.com. "There are no problems with the aircraft blips
picking up the background, so it's all on track."
The system being developed is years behind schedule and millions of
pounds over-budget. The project has been riddled with software
problems, and at one point was reported to have "thousands of
bugs".