HALO

DLR-FX

Operator of HALO is the DLR Flight Experiments (FX) facility. DLR-FX operates the DLR aircraft fleet, the largest civil research aircraft fleet in Europe.

FX is authorised by the German aviation authority (Luftfahrtbundesamt, LBA) to perform maintenance and repair work (including for instance instrument installations) on the research aircraft as a so-called EASA Part-145 Maintenance Organisation. Furthermore, FX has an approved Continuing Airworthiness Management Organisation (CAMO) as well as a Quality Management (QM) office.

DLR-FX is structured into three departments. The flight department of FX (Flugbetrieb, FB) consists of the two research flight departments in Oberpfaffenhofen in Braunschweig, including the CAMO and QM offices as well as the finance/logistics teams. The Design Organisation (Entwicklungsbetrieb, EB) within FX works on the design and airworthiness certification of technical modifications of the aircraft, in particular scientific instruments. The project management department acts as the „single point of contact“ for the scientific users. It coordinates the chronological sequence of project-related tasks between the flight department, the involved development organisations (DLR and others) and the scientific users (instrument developers and operators) as well as administrative and financial aspects of a project.

The research flight department in Oberpfaffenhofen, which is responsible for HALO, is structured into the following four groups:

  • Part-145 Maintenance Organisation („Werft“)
  • Operations
  • Engineering („Flugversuchstechnik“)
  • Sensor and data team

Further information can be found here: Flight Experiments homepage (in English) | German version

HALO Project Management at DLR-FX

The Project Management team forms a small part within DLR-FX, but it his fairly visible to the scientific users because it acts as the main interface between FX and the scientific user communities for DLR’s research aircraft, as illustrated in the following scheme.

Scheme of communication pathways with the HALO project management team as the main interface

Usually one project manager is assigned to all stages of a HALO mission (or certification project), from a first feasibility study to the implementation of actual campaign. Currently there are two project managers working for HALO:

  • Andreas Minikin
  • Thomas Sprünken

Any questions regarding HALO in general, certification projects and scientific missions with HALO should be directed first to the HALO project management. The project management will relay questions and information to the respective experts within FX.