Title: NASA Aeronautics Airspace Systems Program Air Traffic Management Research for the National Airspace System
1NASA Aeronautics Airspace Systems Program Air
Traffic Management Research for the National
Airspace System
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Briefing to the IT Summit
- John A. Cavolowsky
- Director
- Airspace Systems Program
- Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate
- August, 2010
www.nasa.gov
2Background
- Demand for aviation is expected to increase,
creating the need for a system that - Provides two or three times capacity together
with increased safety, security, efficiency and
environmental capacity - Accommodates a range of vehicles including very
large aircraft, very light jets, unmanned
aircraft systems and space launches
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4National Airspace System (NAS)
- On average, about 50,000 flights use NAS services
each day - 14,500 air traffic controllers
- 4,500 aviation safety inspectors, and
- 5,800 technicians to operate and maintain
services - More than 19,000 airports and 600 air traffic
control facilities. In all, there are 41,000 NAS
operational facilities - Over 71,000 pieces of equipment, ranging from
radar systems to communication relay stations
NAS is a highly complex system
5Air Transportation in 2010
- Since its inception, we have seen many
improvements in the aviation system - Air traffic control procedures using radar
separation and clearance-based operations for
individual flights - Avionics including radios, flight management
systems, traffic collision avoidance systems,
data-links, etc. - Aircraft performance
- Todays system is constrained
- Capacity is limited by controller workload
- Demand is managed to meet available capacity
- Uncertainties in weather and flight trajectories
are handled by personnel using operational
judgment - And more
6Participants and Needs
- Operators
- Schedule integrity under all weather conditions
- Fuel efficient operations
- Reduced costs
- Predictability
- Access
- Preferred routes
- Service Providers
- Increased human-system productivity
- Better and up-to-date information
- National and community needs
- Safety
- Minimized environmental impact
- Designed to accommodate future demand
- Passengers
- On time arrival and departure
- Affordability and availability
- Reliability and safety
Multiple needs of air transportation system
7State-of-the-Art
- Current air traffic management system is based on
highly manual operations with limited support
from decision support tools and automation - Role of air traffic management is to maintain
safe, expeditious, and efficient flow of traffic - Strategic decisions (2-6 hours in advance,
Command Center and Facility Traffic Management
Unit) - Establish strategies for NAS and facility flow in
and out of all airports and airspace in presence
of weather and demand/capacity imbalance - Operations in airspace (En route and oceanic,
rest of airspace) - Safely separate aircraft from each other and
avoid severe weather - Provide most efficient operations
- Operations near airport (Terminal, 30-50 miles
from airport) - Separate aircraft and balance arrival/departure
flows - Provide efficient routings for arrivals,
departures, and overflights - Operations at each airport (Tower, 2-5 miles from
airport and on surface) - Provide for safe and efficient movement of
aircraft on taxiways and runways, and
arrivals/departures near airport - Set runway configuration (arrival/departure
allocation) - Current system is not well integrated nor scalable
8Issues and Challenges Ahead
- New types of vehicles and more unscheduled
flights - Allocation of automation between cockpit and
ground - Allocation of functions between automation and
human operators - Graceful degradation of highly automated systems
under off-nominal conditions - Insufficient information sharing between
decision-makers - Leading to uncoordinated decision-making
- Modeling failure and uncertainty
- Dealing with weather uncertainty
- Decision-making using probabilistic information
- Development of fault tolerant systems integration
for safety - Testing of new concepts in todays operations
- Naming just a few
How will the nation address these challenges?
9Achieving Future Air Transportation Capability
- The Next Generation Air Transportation System
vision requires a shift to trajectory-based
operations using 4D trajectories, reduced
separation in dense traffic, dynamic resource
allocation to meet demand, and more - Significant research challenges must be met to
mitigate airportal and airspace constraints to
address the demand/capacity imbalance problem in
a safe, equitable, and efficient manner
NASA transitions advanced technologies and
operational capabilities to implementing
entities. NASA has no operational
responsibilities or authority.
10This slide has been taken in its entirety from a
publicly available JPDO presentation.
11NextGen Transformation
To
From
Ground-based Navigation and Surveillance Satellite-based Navigation and Surveillance
Voice Radio Control Digital Data Exchange
Disconnected Information Systems Net-Centric Information Access
Human-centric Air Traffic Control Automation Assisted Air Traffic Management
Fragmented Weather Forecasting Probabilistic Weather Decision Tools
Visibility Limited Airfield Parameters Equivalent Visual Operations
Forensic Safety System Prognostic Safety System
Inefficient security screening Integrated Security Risk Management
Current aircraft environmental footprint Much reduced aircraft environmental footprint
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12NASA Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate
Integrated Systems Research Program
Fundamental Aeronautics Program
Airspace Systems Program
Conduct research at an integrated system-level
on promising concepts and technologies and
explore/assess/demonstrate the benefits in a
relevant environment
Conduct cutting-edge research that will produce
innovative concepts, tools, and technologies to
enable revolutionary changes for vehicles that
fly in all speed regimes.
Directly address the fundamental ATM research
needs for NextGen by developing revolutionary
concepts, capabilities, and technologies that
will enable significant increases in the
capacity, efficiency and flexibility of the NAS.
Aviation Safety Program
Conduct cutting-edge research that will produce
innovative concepts, tools, and technologies to
improve the intrinsic safety attributes of
current and future aircraft.
SVS HUD
Aeronautics Test Program
Preserve and promote the testing capabilities of
one of the United States largest, most versatile
and comprehensive set of flight and ground-based
research facilities.
13The Airspace System Program
Develop, demonstrate, and transition future
integrated concepts, capabilities, and
technologies that will enable air traffic service
providers to provide major increases in air
traffic management effectiveness, flexibility,
and efficiency, while maintaining safety to meet
capacity and mobility targets consistent with the
NextGen vision
- Concept and Technology Development Project
- Develop gate-to-gate concepts and technologies
towards NextGen to enable significant increases
in capacity and efficiency - Systems Analysis, Integration, Evaluation
Project - Facilitates the RD maturation of integrated
concepts through evaluation in relevant
environments, provides integrated solutions, and
characterizes airspace system problem spaces,
defines innovative approaches, and assesses
potential system impacts and design ramifications
of the programs portfolio.
14The Aeronautics Enterprise
- As the science and application of aeronautics
progressed, an interdependence developed among
the aircraft, the air transportation system, and
the people who use these systems, resulting in a
multi-dimensional, highly integrated aeronautics
enterprise.Treating the entire system as a whole
is complex but necessary, and requires close
coordination among multiple government
departments and agencies as well as industry,
academia, and other non-Federal stakeholders to
ensure that the needs of all enterprise users are
addressed. -
- - National Aeronautics RD Policy
15Systems Requirements for NextGen RD
- Multi-Disciplinary Analysis and Optimization
- Human-Automation Integration
- Decision Making in Uncertainty
- VV and Certification of Complex, Adaptive, and
Non-Deterministic Systems
16Enabling NextGen
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