Operation_Zenith
Operation Zenith
Demonstration of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and Air Traffic Management (ATM) in 2018
Operation Zenith was a demonstration of UAV (commonly known as drones) and ATM integration held at Manchester Airport on November 21, 2018.[1] The event aimed to illustrate that "drones can be flown safely alongside manned aircraft in controlled airspace".[2] A total of eight scenarios[3] were demonstrated in real-time,[4] including On Airfield Delivery,[5] Beyond Visual Line-Of-Sight (BVLOS) Infrastructure Inspection,[6] and Commercial VLOS Operations.[7]
The event was coordinated by Air Navigation Service Provider for the United Kingdom, NATS,[8] and British Tech Start-Up, Altitude Angel.[9] A total of 13 independent organisations also took part in the event as "delivery partners",[10] including Vodafone,[11] DJI[12] and Frequentis.[13]
It is regarded as one of the first live demonstrations of its kind[14][15] and was considered to be the "most technically complex and comprehensive demonstration in the world so far of an UTM (Unmanned aircraft system traffic management) system".[16]
In August 2019, Operation Zenith was a finalist in the CANSO Award of Excellence in ATM.[17]