China's BeiDou global satellite navigation system has reached another turning point in its development. The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) released a systematic roadmap for the application and technical support for use of the system by civil aircraft nationwide.

The Beidou system is one of the core constellations of the global satellite navigation system, and its application is divided into three stages. The first goal is to realize the application of Beidou in general aviation low-altitude airspace positioning and surveillance by the end of 2021, promoting the high-quality development of the civil aviation industry.

The inspector of the Air Traffic Control Industry Management Office of CAAC Liu Lianxi said in the field of general aviation, they are not able to achieve real-time control of flight dynamics due to the simple airborne equipment, wide range of operations and low flight altitude of general aircraft.

"General aviation often operates over sparsely populated forest areas, and sometimes after flight accidents difficulty in getting timely information on the location hinders search and rescue operations. The use of the BeiDou satellite can help solve this problem. It will fill a gap in navigation surveillance and greatly improve the safety and management of navigation," Liu said.

In the field of transportation aviation, Liu said the current satellite-based navigation uses GPS signals. However, hundreds of flights have been delayed or canceled due to abnormal GPS signals in several regions since May this year. To solve the security risks caused by the vulnerability of GPS single constellation, it is necessary to bring the BeiDou system into the network and realize the complementarity of multiple constellations.

"In the future, we will realize the tracking and monitoring of independent intellectual property rights of all transport aircraft using BeiDou positioning and other communication technology means, to realize the dual-frequency multi-constellation navigation function of all transport aircraft based on BeiDou by 2035."