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Volpe Center Highlights - July/August 2003

Focus

Director's Notes | Focus | Safety | Mobility and Economic Growth
Human and Natural Environment | Organizational Excellence | Homeland Security
Awards | Papers and Presentations

The Volpe Center's wide range of aviation-related work helps the FAA address passenger mobility and safety in the air and on the ground. (Photograph from Getty Images)

Improving Aviation Mobility and Safety (FAA/NASA)

Among the many challenges facing U.S. aviation, two of the most important are enhancing the efficiency of air-traffic flow and improving the safety of aviation systems. The Volpe Center provides significant support to federal agencies addressing these challenges; this article highlights efforts to reduce en route air traffic congestion and runway accidents.

Congestion Management
Key to reducing en route congestion in the nation's airways is the integration of new technologies and techniques that enable more effective responses to changing conditions, such as congestion, equipment outages, and weather. Recent Volpe upgrades to two sophisticated decision-support tools make considerable contributions in the areas of air traffic management and en route air traffic modeling.

Air traffic managers interact with ETMS through the Traffic Situation Display (TSD), a graphical display of air traffic, weather, alerts, and statistical information. The TSD screen above shows more than 5,000 flights being tracked over the United States. Managers can click on any flight icon to display flight information, as shown in the lower left corner. (View larger image.)

Innovative Features in New ETMS Release Reduce Delays
The Enhanced Traffic Management System (ETMS) is an automation system developed and operated by Volpe's Automated Applications Division for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to track, anticipate, and manage the flow of air traffic throughout U.S. airspace. It integrates real-time flight and weather data from multiple sources, presenting information graphically in a highly adaptable format. ETMS Version 7.6, deployed in May 2003 in time for the severe weather season, includes new capabilities for en route congestion management, enhanced collaborative decision making with airlines, and access to improved severe weather forecasts.

This release introduces innovative tools to reduce delays between major airports. The Reroute Advisory Tool automatically generates a list of flights affected by air traffic rerouting to permit faster decision-making by FAA and the airlines about those flights. The upgrade also provides enhanced ability to display, analyze, and share information on areas of airspace congestion. A new technique, Slot Credit Substitution, developed as part of the FAA's Collaborative Decision Making Program (see sidebar), was also implemented. When an airline flight is delayed or canceled, this technique allows the airline's dispatchers to trade its arrival slot for a future "slot credit" that can be used for a later flight; another airline may be authorized to use the traded arrival slot. This will ensure that airport arrival capacity is better utilized during critical, busy times.

Convective weather is a major contributing factor to aviation delays, so accurate weather information is essential. The National Convective Weather Forecast, a one-hour forecast of the location of thunderstorms, is now available to air traffic management specialists through ETMS Version 7.6.

ETMS refinement continues. When congestion or weather limit the number of aircraft in a sector of airspace, the FAA may change the sector boundaries to accommodate traffic in adjacent space. That process is known as "Dynamic Sectorization," and the Volpe team is now developing a new version of ETMS that will handle this important technique.

ETMS is sponsored by the FAA's Air Traffic Systems Development organization for use by traffic flow managers and specialists at the FAA's Air Traffic Control Systems Command Center (ATCSCC), Air Route Traffic Control Centers, select Terminal Radar Approach Control Facilities, select Air Traffic Control Towers, and other facilities. The Volpe ETMS team is composed of staff from the Automated Applications Division.

SWEPT Upgrade Enhances Congestion Management Planning
The Volpe Center serves as system integrator, technology-transfer agent, and primary developer of the System-Wide Evaluation and Planning Tool (SWEPT), a research and development model of the national air traffic system. Based on real and/or simulated data, the SWEPT prototype is designed for real-time and off-line analysis, planning, monitoring, and evaluation of air traffic management initiatives, procedures, and dynamic flight scenarios. SWEPT enables modeling of en route air traffic. En route modeling plays an important role in congestion management planning, as the FAA can use it to develop and safely evaluate new methods for congestion management. Moreover, projecting future benefits of new methods helps the airline industry to understand what efficiencies can be gained by potential changes.

Sponsored by National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Ames's Advanced Air Transportation Technology Program and directed by NASA Ames's Automation Concepts Branch, SWEPT is based on the NASA-developed modeling tool FACET, or Future ATM Concepts and Evaluation Tool.

In May 2003, the Volpe Center's SWEPT project team released and installed a new version at the FAA's ATCSCC. In parallel with the upgrade release, the Volpe SWEPT team, led by Mr. James R. Hill of the Automation Applications Division and colleagues at NASA Ames, met with select user representatives at the ATCSCC to review the new release and to collect feedback and suggestions for future developments.

Runway Safety
Although aircraft safety is usually associated with in-flight dangers, a collision of two aircraft on the ground caused by a runway incursion is far more likely than a collision in the air. A runway incursion occurs when an aircraft or ground vehicle inadvertently taxis or drives onto an active runway, presenting a hazard to aircraft that are taking off or landing. Runway incursions have been blamed for several major accidents; accordingly, their elimination has become the FAA's leading safety-enhancement program. The Volpe Center, in support of the FAA's Office of Runway Safety (ARI) is leading the data analysis effort aimed at reducing the number of runway incursions, particularly the more serious incursions. The Volpe Center is also engaged in several other projects to reduce runway incursions, including the development of air traffic systems that depict traffic status on airport surface and approaches in real-time. Two more recent contributions to this effort--runway status lights and human factors issues--are highlighted on the next page.

When surveillance data indicate that the runway ahead of an aircraft in position for takeoff is occupied, or shortly will be occupied, the runway status lights at that takeoff position are illuminated.

Runway Status Lights Help Prevent Accidents
The FAA's Runway Status Lights (RWSL) Program will help to prevent the hazards associated with runway incursions by providing a visual warning to pilots and ground-vehicle operators that the runway is not safe to enter. An array of red "stop" lights will be placed at each taxiway and runway intersection. The fully automated lights are controlled by the radar-based RWSL system. The lights reinforce controller commands and act as a safety backup for the controller.

The Volpe Center RWSL team is involved in the development, testing, evaluation, and deployment of runway status lights. In May 2003, the Volpe team successfully completed the acquisition, integration, and demonstration of test instrumentation; the test equipment will be shipped to the San Diego airport, where an evaluation of the runway status lights software will be conducted. After the software evaluation, the prototype light system will be installed and an operational evaluation will be performed. The Volpe team consists of Mr. Vincent Orlando and Ms. Sarasina Sulijoadikusumo of the Airport Surface Division.

Human Factors Issues Are Critical to Runway Safety
The Volpe Center's Operator Performance and Safety Analysis Division has been supporting the FAA's Runway Safety Office in several areas, including the analysis of incident data, the development of a method for categorizing the severity of runway incursions, and the development of educational materials for pilots and controllers on preventing runway incursions.

In June 2003, Dr. Daniel J. Hannon of the Division spoke at the FAA's Eastern Region's Runway Safety Summit in New York City. The focus of

Dr. Hannon's presentation was human factors in runway safety. Results of recent data analysis were presented along with demonstrations of human factors issues critical for runway safety. Human factors issues are associated with pilots, controllers, and vehicle operators.

Dr. Kim Cardosi of the Division was the keynote speaker at the Southern Region's Runway Safety Summit held in May 2003 in Miami, Florida.

Dr. Cardosi presented results of recent data analysis and suggested potential remedies for the runway incursion problem to an international audience of pilots and controllers.

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