Airfield Wind Advisory Systems for General Aviation

An Airfield Wind Advisory System (AWAS) includes a self-contained weather station, located at an airfield, that measures speed and direction of the wind, the temperature, the barometric pressure, and the humidity. This ground station digitizes these measurements and transmits the measurement data in real time, via radio, to portable units in aircraft cockpits. The portable units automatically detect the data and display the information to pilots. In 1999, a prototype of the AWAS system was demonstrated to function successfully in tests at Kennedy Space Center's Space Shuttle Landing Facility in 1999.