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Ground Light System

Ground Light System

This section describes the GroundLightSystem feature which is shown in the figure below.

The emergencyLighting attribute specifies whether there is a backup system available for the lighting system. The attributes intensityLevel and colour are discussed in the Light element section of this page

Light Element


LightElement objects are used to model each individual light of the system. The location of the element is encoded as an ElevatedPoint.

The elevation attribute can be used to encode the vertical position of the light element with reference to the mean sea level. The model does not give the possibility to encode the height of a light element above the ground (e.g. mounted on a pole).

The colour of the light element is chosen from a list of possible values like 'WHITE', 'YELLOW', 'RED', etc.

A classification of the light's intensity is given by the intensityLevel attribute, which has discrete values (''LIH', 'LIM', 'LIL', etc.). The exact intensity, expressed as a numerical value, is encoded in the intensity attribute.

Note that the attributes intensityLevel and colour exist both in the GroundLightSystem and in the LightElement classes.This supports the current way of publishing the information, where AIP typically contain only a high-level description of the runway lighting (colour, intensity, spacing, etc.), without providing data about each individual light element. Therefore, these attributes are necessary in the GroundLightSystem class also, in case there is no LightElement data.

The type attribute can either have 'FLOOD', 'STROBE' or 'OTHER' as a value, indicating if the light is steady or flashing.

open question

In the class definition FLOOD is described as a lamp that produces a strong broad beam of artificial light and is used to illuminate the outside at night. This does not exactly describe the characteristics of a runway light as it is also used during daylight in IMC and its purpose is not to illuminate the ground but to act as a visual reference. Additionally for a STROBE light the frequency of the flashes might be of interest, but it is not supported by he current model.

Availability


The general availability of the lighting system is encoded by a GroundLightingAvailability which is connected to the GroundLighSystem feature via the isOperationalBy association. The operationalStatus of the system can be either 'NORMAL', 'DOWNGRADED', 'UNSERVICEABLE', 'WORK_IN_PROGRESS' or 'OTHER'.