Lufthansa Flight Training premieres world's first EP-1000CT visual system
May 20, 2003
Lufthansa Flight Training premieres world's first EP-1000CT visual system
Lufthansa Flight Training GmbH (LFT) is introducing its customers to a new dimension in simulator training. On 15 May 2003 in Frankfurt am Main the world's first EP-1000CT visual system, made by Evans & Sutherland, was certified by Germany's federal aviation authority on a B767-300 simulator for regular pilot-training purposes. This confirmed the previously obtained D-level certification of that simulator. The certification also applies to Lufthansa Flight Training's A340-300 full-flight simulator.

"This will make our training more realistic," promises Wolf-Dieter Hass, head of LFT's simulator center. "The EP-1000CT is the first visual system that provides a three-dimensional view of the entire globe with all continents and oceans – one that shows the complete elevation profile." In the past, the only topographic features depicted were those within a radius of at most 40 miles from the airport. From now on, pilots will have a highly realistic view of the actual surroundings even on simulated flights over the Alps and Himalayas.

Thanks to modern computer technology, the airport itself and its immediate environs will be shown more realistically and in greater detail thanks to aerial photographs and satellite pictures. "It's not that the airport will have suddenly become much more active but that, depending on weather conditions, the view of it is now entirely different," Hass explains. "For example, we're now able to simulate rainfalls and snowfalls."

For 2003 Lufthansa Flight Training plans to equip a total of seven of its full-flight simulators with the new high-resolution visual system in 2003 – five at its Frankfurt facility, two at its Berlin facility. In the summer of 2004 it will take delivery of three new simulators: one of the Airbus A330-300 Enhanced, one of the A320-200 and one of the B747-400. Those will come equipped with the EP-1000CT. LFT's simulator fleet will then have 31 full-flight simulators, whose technical details can be downloaded from the Internet page www.lufthansa-flight-training.com.

A wholly owned subsidiary of Lufthansa German Airlines, Lufthansa Flight Training has more than 50 years of experience in training cockpit and cabin crews. In addition to Lufthansa, many other well-known airlines look to LFT for simulator training, training in emergency and service procedures, as well as for e-learning.

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