Innovative application of existing technology for improving aviation weather reporting systems in rural Alaska

Rural airports in the interior of Alaska suffer from nonexistent, unreliable and insufficient systems to collect information about weather and runway conditions. This lack of information increases risk, reduces efficiency and limits the quality of service that air carriers provide to rural locations. Alaska has the worst aviation safety record of any state in the Union. Inferior information reporting systems contribute to the problem. New or enhanced systems are needed to improve the reliability and accuracy of weather and runway information in this most unforgiving environment. In this paper, the authors describe how an unsolicited research project was undertaken to demonstrated the capabilities and benefits of the use of remote video technology to enhance the weather and runway condition reporting system at rural airstrips in interior Alaska