Arinc offers radiation monitoring

Flight services provider Arinc has added an automatic radiation calculating feature to its Arinc Direct flight solution package. Portfolio subscribers will be able to use the feature free of charge to track the potential radiation exposure of their flight crews.

“We are responding to a growing awareness in our industry of the potential effect of repeated low-level exposure to radiation during flight,” said Dave Poltorak, Arinc’s vice president for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The thin atmosphere at high altitude is known to expose aircraft crews to varying levels of background radiation from outer space. European regulators consider this such a threat that they have established cumulative exposure rules for commercial flight crews.

According to Poltorak, customers can use their accounts to collect and report dosimetry data for individual crewmembers based on planned flight routes, altitudes and flight times. The system takes into account such variables as the geographic measurements of the actual cosmic and solar radiation levels present at the time of flights. Austrian radiation monitoring specialist IASON archives such data and, as part of its agreement with Arinc, forwards it to the Annapolis, Md.-based company’s clients weekly.