Terminal velocity

The commissioning of a new terminal at Cairo International Airport would not have been complete without a new top of the range sound system. The choice for CSI Egypt, the PA installers, was clear – Bosch’s Praesideo public address and emergency sound system.

With more than 14m passengers and just under 143,000 aircraft passing through it in 2009, Cairo International is the busiest airport in Egypt and the second busiest in Africa after Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International. The airport is used by 58 passenger airlines, including charter operators, 10 cargo operators, and has a total capacity of 21m million passengers per year, divided over the three terminal buildings. Strategically positioned between Africa, the Middle East and Europe, the airport has become a major international hub for the region.

Cairo International Airport Authority is continuously investing to achieve the highest international levels of safety, service and passenger comfort. Major improvements have already been made to Terminals 1 and 2, and the airport authority’s largest and most ambitious project to date – the new Terminal 3 – has just completed its first year in operation.

The Egyptian Ministry of Civil Aviation began construction on Terminal 3 in 2004 after growth projections and the limited ability to expand Terminal 2 deemed it necessary. The terminal was officially inaugurated in December 2008 and opened for commercial operations at the end of April 2009.

The new terminal is twice as large as Terminals 1 and 2 combined, with a capacity to handle up to 11m passengers annually (6m international and 5m domestic). The terminal complex consists of a three-level main building and two symmetrical concourses totalling 211,000-sq-m. The building contains arrival and departure halls, basement facilities, baggage-handling facilities, workshops, a main control room and over 6,000-sq-m of retail space. There are also two extendible piers for boarding, and gate facilities serving domestic and international traffic connected to the main building by concourses. It is the new home of 27 international and domestic airlines (including the national carrier, EgyptAir) capable of carrying 11,000 passengers each day on some 200 scheduled flights.

The terminal is equipped with the latest cutting edge technology including self-service kiosks (CUSS) in the check-in hall, the first biometric immigration desks in the country and fully automated baggage-handling system with integrated online screening. This is in addition to information kiosks, strategically placed throughout the building.

Terminal 3 has 23 gates (two gates for the Airbus A380), six check-in islands consisting of 110 counters (plus 10 mobile counters and 10 CUSS kiosks), 76 emigration and immigration counters (plus five biometric gates), 52 contact and remote aircraft parking stands (five with multiple use), 425 FIDS, 15 public information points, seven baggage carousels, 63 elevators, 50 moving walkways and 51 escalators.

Digital sound

Of course, the millions of travellers passing through the airport every year are mostly unaware of the truly advanced technology that lies behind the scenes of this modern facility. This includes a Praesideo digital public address and voice evacuation system from Bosch. Bosch Dealer CSI Egypt was commissioned to install the new sound system in Terminal 3.

The decision of the project consultant and the airport authority to choose the Praesideo was not a difficult one, as CSI Egypt had already successfully installed similar systems in the airports at Sharm El Sheikh, Luxor and Marsa Alam. Further to this, its IEC 60849 system certification, audio transmission via the Local Area Network using CobraNet interfaces, and redundant network controller functionality helped with the selection.

The Praesideo system is also fully programmable and configurable from a PC. This provides a high degree of flexibility in terms of zone assignments and numbers, call stations, audio inputs and outputs, and control inputs and outputs.

The system is made up of four separate racks located in the main control room, the concourse area and at each of the two piers. The equipment list for the project includes five network controllers (including one hot standby controller), 25 Praesideo 500W amplifiers, 12 Praesideo 2 x 250W amplifiers, four CobraNet Interfaces, multiple call stations with call station keypads and a range of ceiling, projector, passive line array and Intellivox loudspeakers.

Large coverage

It was a large area that the system needed to cover. The PA and EVAC system in Terminal 3 had to cover the international arrival and departure halls, the domestic arrival and departure hall, the customs clearance area, the restaurants, the VIP lounge and the shopping area.

The main issues that had to be considered during installation and commissioning were reaching the Speech Transmission Index (STI) level defined in the original design, adjusting the delay time between active and passive loudspeakers to eliminate echoing, and fulfilling specific operator requirements. This included providing facilities for the operators to be able to monitor the music/call output level in dB in each zone from the control room. This was achieved using a third-party monitor panel connected to the Praesideo power amplifiers. All other challenges were easily met thanks to the system’s advanced programming functionality and measurement tools.

After the installation was complete, the airport operators also discovered a need for extra call stations in some new areas that were not allowed for in the original plans. To accommodate this late change, a wireless microphone system from Bosch was added and linked to the Praesideo system.

The new Praesideo system in Terminal 3 broadcasts live and pre-recorded messages, provides four background music (BGM) programmes and generates voice alarm evacuation messages in emergency situations. It also interconnects with the Fire Alarm and the Flight Information Systems so that data generated by these systems can trigger the Praesideo to make the appropriate announcement in pre-programmed zones.

Winning acclaim

The Praesideo’s digital sound guarantees freedom from interference, freedom from signal corruption and very high signal-to-noise ratio. So messages are just as clear coming out of the system as when they enter – guaranteeing high speech intelligibility and message delivery.

As a result of this, the sound installation at Cairo Airport’s Terminal 3 far exceeded the airport authority’s expectations. This has now led to the Praesideo system winning considerable acclaim in Egypt and being classified as the recommended system for all future airport projects in the country.

www.csiegypt.com

Published in PAME May June