Capturing turnaround times: reported, detected or confirmed on the apron

Every plan for a turnaround rests on a handful of times: when deboarding started, when fuelling was done, when the doors closed. Airport CDM is built on such events. Eurocontrol's specification follows each departing flight through a sequence of milestones, and the ground handler may update the target off-block time when the turnaround calls for it ¹. About the individual processes between in-block and off-block, however, the milestones say little, as researchers from TU Dresden, Bundeswehr University Munich and Eurocontrol point out ³. Yet that is where much of the delay begins. In 2024, airline-related causes such as ramp handling, boarding and staff shortage accounted for 4.3 of the 17.5 minutes of delay per flight in Europe, second only to knock-on delay ⁴. What such a minute costs is the subject of our article on the cost of a delay minute.

So how do the times of each process get into the system? There are three ways today: someone reports them, a camera detects them, or the people who do the work confirm them. This text compares the three and ends with questions that help a regional airport choose.

Reported: radio, phone and paper

At many stations the times still travel by voice. A ramp agent radios that loading is complete, someone in dispatch notes it or types it in, and the rest is entered after the turnaround. This needs nothing new, and it is flexible: anyone can report anything.

Its limits show when the times start to matter. An entry made afterwards is only as exact as the note behind it. What one partner writes down, the others see only when someone passes it on. And the effort is real. Eurocontrol describes how the milestones approach can mean monitoring up to 16 milestones per flight, and how the perceived workload has slowed down A-CDM, particularly at airports with limited resources for such tasks ².

Detected: cameras and sensors

The second approach takes people out of the recording. Cameras at the stand and image recognition detect events: the aircraft arrives, a vehicle docks, a door opens. Many airports already use such techniques to follow their turnarounds, and stand monitoring systems can record the operations around the aircraft ³. The times arrive without anyone typing them, for every turnaround on a monitored stand.

A camera records what it sees. Its view ends at the cabin door and at the edge of its stand, and a remote stand without a camera stays dark. It sees the de-icing truck at the aircraft, but not the quantity of fluid or who ordered the service. Complete data is not a given there either: in the data set of the Dresden and Munich study, recorded at a European airport with stand monitoring, few turnaround records were complete ³.

Confirmed: by the people who do the work

The third approach is the one GroundSync takes, so read this section with that in mind. Staff on the apron confirm each process step in an app, with one tap, at the moment they finish it. The confirmation carries the device time and the location. It works at any parking position, remote stands included, and inside the aircraft for onboard services. Without a network the app keeps the original time and syncs later.

What makes these times trustworthy is who sets them: the people who did the work, on the apron, at the moment it happened. That is what we mean by verified & confirmed timestamps. Every process has a responsible partner, and if a time has to be corrected later, only that partner can do it, and the correction stays visible. Services such as GPU, de-icing or PRM are recorded per turnaround with quantity and duration, so the record is also the proof for billing.

The condition is just as clear: someone has to tap. The approach works when confirming is quicker than not confirming, and when the team knows why it matters. That is a question of training and habit more than of technology. With GroundSync, a team is ready after one to two hours of training.

Side by side

Better together

The three approaches do not exclude each other. Cameras and sensors are strong where they can see: they record without anyone lifting a finger. Confirmations are strong where only people know: in the cabin, at a remote stand, for a service with a quantity. And the radio stays, for the unexpected.

What matters is that the times end up in one record that every partner sees at the same moment. GroundSync connects with the systems before and after it: sensors, cameras, flight data and AODB on one side, billing, accounting, BI and reporting tools on the other. A detected event and a confirmed step then sit on the same timeline, and each partner sees what is shared with it, process by process.

Questions for a regional airport

Which approach fits depends less on the technology than on your station. Five questions help:

1. How many of your stands could cameras cover, and how many are remote stands?
2. Which processes take place where no camera can see, for example in the cabin?
3. Which services do you bill, and how do you prove them today?
4. Who needs which times, and who should see which processes?
5. How much installation and maintenance can your airport take on?

If most answers point to the apron, the times are best captured where they arise. With GroundSync that starts without any installation: setup takes two weeks, followed by a free pilot month at your station.