Operational A-Weighted Noise Exposure in Airport Apron Environments: A Field Survey of Ground Handling Activities Under APU, GPU and PCA Configurations

The airport apron is a demanding occupational environment for ground handling personnel, who are exposed to multiple and variable noise sources; yet how this exposure varies by task and location has not been adequately characterised. This study addresses three research questions: (RQ1) what LAeq,T levels are measured at the nose, wing, and tail sections under APU, GPU, and PCA configurations; (RQ2) considering both measured levels and typical task durations, which duty group most warrants targeted occupational health and safety protection; and (RQ3) to what extent do mobile GPU/PCA units, commonly regarded as a “quiet” alternative, contribute to the local noise environment. Fixed-point, task-based spot measurements were carried out at the nose, wing, and tail at a high-intensity leisure-hub airport, and readings sharing the same nominal configuration were pooled as unweighted energetic averages. Under APU operation with bleed on during narrow-body aircraft turnaround, the highest configuration-averaged levels reached 94.7 dB at the wing and 93.2 dB at the tail, whereas under the mobile GPU-only configuration, levels fell to 82.1, 76.8, and 83.5 dB at the nose, wing, and tail, respectively—a location-dependent difference of 7–18 dB across the sampled configurations. Baggage handlers emerged as the highest-priority group, reflecting the longest continuous exposure sustained in closest proximity to the APU; refuelling operators formed a second priority group, while the relative ranking of catering and water/waste personnel could not be established without full-shift dosimetry. Prior work has largely examined environmental aircraft noise or individual sources in isolation; by contrast, this study is among the first to spatially resolve simultaneous multi-source exposure across turnaround tasks and power configurations at a high-intensity leisure-hub airport. A preliminary, single-instance observation further suggests that mobile GPU/PCA units, often assumed to be benign, may themselves not be acoustically negligible, warranting further investigation.