Appareo Fleet Management Device
Appareo Systems worked closely with the Bristow Group to develop the first phase of the Appareo FMD in a less than a year - a remarkably short time for such a complex project. Appareo's strengths in agile software development enabled the FMD team to not only cut development time, but also to keep project costs low for Bristow.
Background
As one of the largest operators of helicopters in the world, Bristow fields hundreds of aircraft around the globe and faces complicated billing, crew scheduling and load-planning challenges. In their efforts to find a cost effective, fully integrated solution for minimizing these challenges, Bristow partnered with Appareo Systems to develop a customized FMD solution that would function not only in the U.S. but also at Bristow bases around the world.
The Solution
The Appareo FMD eliminates those difficulties with one easy-to-use product designed for the demanding cockpit environment of a light helicopter. Relying on an exceptionally functional and attractive touch screen user-interface, flight crews can easily accomplish all of their pre and post flight record keeping tasks in much less time and with more accuracy than with standard handwritten methods.
When the crew returns to their base at the end of a trip, all the data captured by the FMD is automatically transferred to the appropriate departments for billing, maintenance and crew scheduling.
The Appareo FMD also simplifies the critical task of weight and balance planning by using an innovative graphical center of balance tool. The Bristow FMD automatically calculates the best load plan based upon the pre-supplied passenger and cargo manifests and shows the resulting configuration in an easy to understand visual map of the aircraft.
In future feature implementations, crews will also have access to accurate weather information, crew-scheduling updates, and navigational aids such as a moving-map display.
The Appareo EFB in use in the cockpit of one of Bristow's S92 helicopters |
Appareo FMD - Robust Solution for Safety and Efficiency