Aircraft turnarounds depend on many tightly coordinated activities, but meaningful improvement often begins with one clearly defined operational problem. At SWISS, that starting point was passenger counting: a safety-critical and time-sensitive task that has traditionally required manual effort and concentration from cabin crew. When results are uncertain, the process can also create additional workload through recounts.
SWISS and VION AI, a Trifork company, therefore launched the On-Board Count (OBC) initiative with a focused objective: to test whether computer vision and AI could automate passenger counting with the reliability and robustness required for real airline operations. The current model is showing very promising results, with individual passenger count accuracy above 99%. Performance continues to improve as the team works towards the final operational thresholds required for deployment in real-life operations during day-to-day service.
Automating passenger counting is significantly more complex than detecting people in a controlled environment. The solution must perform consistently across different aircraft types, cabin layouts, lighting conditions, and boarding patterns, as well as the many variations that occur during live operations. It must distinguish passenger movements from crew activity and other operational events, protect the privacy of everyone involved, and operate without disrupting established workflows.
Together with Trifork, SWISS is now testing this new aircraft-centric Vision AI capability designed for these demanding conditions. The solution combines aviation-specific computer vision models, edge processing, operational testing, and the team is working in close collaboration with the SWISS teams who understand and fine-tune the process in practice.
“Safety will always be our highest priority, but we also want to make everyday tasks as simple and efficient as possible for our cabin crews. Automating the passenger count reduces a repetitive manual task and give our crews more time to focus on what matters most: ensuring a safe operation and looking after our guests.”
The immediate objective is clear: to deliver and roll out automated passenger counting across operations in autumn 2026, with the accuracy able to pass a full flight and robustness required to support daily operations in a useful and dependable way. By reducing the need for manual counting, the solution has the potential to save cabin crews time and effort, allowing them to focus more fully on safety, service, and their guests.
The initiative is also helping SWISS and Trifork understand what is required for Vision AI to operate reliably in a highly regulated, safety-focused, and operationally demanding environment. This includes representative data, robust performance across edge cases, suitable hardware and deployment models, integration with existing processes, and clear accountability for how the resulting information is used.
Following the integration of VION AI into Trifork in spring 2026 and the encouraging progress of the OBC initiative, SWISS and Trifork are now exploring opportunities beyond passenger counting.
Passenger counting remains the original priority, but the partners are also establishing a broader technical and operational foundation. The same aircraft-centric Vision AI capability can observe selected activities around the aircraft, including deboarding progress, crew changes, catering and cleaning milestones, turnaround events, and different types of carry-on baggage, generating both real-time information and precise timestamps for key events.
These data points could provide insight into operational activities not fully captured by existing systems. By complementing established data sources with live observations and timestamped events, the capability could support earlier identification of deviations, more precise process measurement, meaningful post-processing, and better-informed operational decisions. SWISS and Trifork are therefore assessing where this additional insight can create measurable operational improvements and business value.
“The aviation industry has invested heavily in systems that tell us what should happen. We are exploring technologies that can help us understand what is happening right now. Real-time operational awareness around the aircraft could open the door to a new generation of data-driven decision-making, operational efficiency, and safety.
Turning technical possibilities into operational value requires close collaboration with the people who own and understand the relevant processes. Ground operations, turnaround management, and network processes are complex domains with established responsibilities, specialised expertise, and existing transformation initiatives.
SWISS and Trifork are working with the relevant operational, process, and system experts to define a path for implementing these use cases, understand dependencies, and realise the value of Vision AI-generated data.
While real-time data supports immediate operational decisions, post-flight data helps us understand performance trends, identify inefficiencies, and optimize processes over time. Together, they enable a continuous improvement cycle that enhances efficiency, operational reliability, and safety.”
As SWISS and Trifork implement passenger counting in live operations, the technology has revealed a broader opportunity: to complement established systems with real-time, aircraft-centric insight.
By transforming selected physical events into reliable operational data, Vision AI closes visibility gaps and support faster, more precise, and more adaptive turnaround decisions – without disrupting existing workflows and capable of being integrated with existing systems.
The initiative builds on a long-standing partnership between SWISS and Trifork, developed through more than 15 years of collaboration. This shared operational understanding provides a strong foundation for applying new technologies to one of aviation’s most critical and time-sensitive processes.
The same capability may support further improvements across the turnaround process. SWISS and Trifork are now identifying and validating these opportunities with the relevant experts and business owners, one clearly defined value driver at a time.
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