Source: http://www.google.com/patents/US6873903?dq=5,912,661
Timestamp: 2015-05-29 11:32:01
Document Index: 604250925

Matched Legal Cases: ['Application No. 60', 'Application No. 60', 'Application No. 60', 'Application No. 60', 'Application No. 60', 'Application No. 60']

Patent US6873903 - Method and system for tracking and prediction of aircraft trajectories - Google PatentsSearch Images Maps Play YouTube News Gmail Drive More »Sign inAdvanced Patent SearchPatentsA method for predicting the trajectory of an aircraft is disclosed. It yields the arrival/departure times for a plurality of aircraft with respect to a specified system resource and is based upon specified data and other operational factors pertaining to the aircraft and system resource. This process...http://www.google.com/patents/US6873903?utm_source=gb-gplus-sharePatent US6873903 - Method and system for tracking and prediction of aircraft trajectoriesAdvanced Patent SearchPublication numberUS6873903 B2Publication typeGrantApplication numberUS 10/238,032Publication dateMar 29, 2005Filing dateSep 6, 2002Priority dateSep 7, 2001Fee statusPaidAlso published asUS20030050746Publication number10238032, 238032, US 6873903 B2, US 6873903B2, US-B2-6873903, US6873903 B2, US6873903B2InventorsR. Michael Baiada, Lonnie H. BowlinOriginal AssigneeR. Michael Baiada, Lonnie H. BowlinExport CitationBiBTeX, EndNote, RefManPatent Citations (11), Referenced by (35), Classifications (7), Legal Events (3) External Links: USPTO, USPTO Assignment, EspacenetMethod and system for tracking and prediction of aircraft trajectories
This application is related to the following U.S. Patent Applications: Provisional Application No. 60/332,614, filed Nov. 19, 2001 and entitled “Method And System For Allocating Aircraft Arrival/Departure Slot Times,” Provisional Application No. 60/317,803, filed Sep. 7, 2001 and entitled “Method And System For Tracking and Prediction of Aircraft Arrival and Departure Times,” Regular application Ser. No. 09/861,262, filed May 18, 2001 and entitled “Method And System For Aircraft Flow Management By Airlines/Aviation Authorities”, Provisional Application No. 60/274,109, filed Mar. 8, 2001 and entitled “Method And System For Aircraft Flow Management By Aviation Authorities”, Regular application Ser. No. 09/549,074, filed Apr. 16, 2000 and entitled “Method And System For Tactical Airline Management,” Provisional Application No. 60/189,223, filed Mar. 14, 2000 and entitled “Tactical Airline Management,” Provisional Application No. 60/173,049, filed Dec. 24, 1999 and entitled “Tactical Airline Management,” and Provisional Application No. 60/129,563, filed Apr. 16, 1999 and entitled “Tactical Aircraft Management.” All these applications having been submitted by the same applicants: R. Michael Baiada and Lonnie H. Bowlin. The teachings of these applications are incorporated herein by reference to the extent that they do not conflict with the teaching herein.
The effect of the ATC's “take a ticket and wait” solution on arrival/departure aircraft is to add 1, 5, 10, 15 or more minutes to the arrival/departure time. It is a goal of the present invention to encompass the effect of this “too many aircraft” and other factors in the development of more accurate, flight trajectory prediction methods.
Unfortunately, to correct over capacity problems in the current art, the controller only has one option. They take the first over-capacity aircraft that arrives at the airport and move it backward in time. The second such aircraft is moved further back in time, the third, even further back, etc. Without a process in the current art to move aircraft forward in time or alter the arrival/departure sequence in real time, the controller has only one option—delays.
Structured Dogleg Arrival/Departure Routes—The structured routings into an arrival/departure are typically designed with doglegs. The design of the dogleg is two straight segments joined by an angle of less than 180 degrees. The purpose of the dogleg is to allow controllers to cut the corner as necessary to maintain the correct spacing between arrival/departure aircraft.
Vectoring and Speed Control—If the actual spacing is more or less than the desired spacing, the controller can alter the speed of the aircraft to correct the spacing. Additionally, if the spacing is significantly smaller than desired, the controller can vector (turn) the aircraft off the route momentarily to increase the spacing. Given the last minute nature of these actions (within 100 mile of the airport), the outcome of such actions is limited.
The Approach Trombone—If too many aircraft arrive at a particular airport in a given period of time, the distance between the runway and base leg can be increased; see FIG. 7. This effectively lengthens the final approach and downwind legs allowing the controller to “store” or warehouse in-flight aircraft.
Miles in Trail—If the approach trombone can't handle the over demand for the runway asset, the ATC system begins spreading out the arrival/departure aircraft flows linearly. It does this by implementing “miles-in-trail” restrictions. Effectively, as the aircraft approach the airport for arrival/departure, instead of 5 to 10 miles between aircraft on the linear arrival/departure path, the controllers begin spacing the aircraft at twenty or more miles in trail, one behind the other; see FIG. 8.
Ground Holds—If the CAA separation authorities anticipate that the approach trombone and the miles-in-trail methods will not hold the aircraft overload, aircraft are held at their departure point and metered into the airspace system using assigned takeoff times.
Holding—If events happen too quickly, the controllers are forced to use airborne holding. Although this can be done anywhere in the system, this is usual done at one of the arrival/departures to an airport. Aircraft enter the “holding stack” from the enroute airspace at the top; see FIG. 9. Each holding pattern is approximately 10 to 20 miles long and 3 to 5 miles wide. As aircraft exit the bottom of the stack towards the airport, aircraft orbiting above are moved down 1,000 feet to the next level.
Reroute—If a section of airspace, enroute center, or airport is projected to become overloaded, the aviation authority occasionally reroutes individual aircraft over a longer lateral route to delay the aircraft's entry to the predicted congestion.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a method and system that will enable the airspace users to better manage their aircraft by continuously and more accurately predicting the location of each aircraft along a forward looking time line x hours into the future—a long trajectory.
Such objects are different from the current art, which typically tracks and predicts aircraft arrival times for a single flight, does not account for all of the outside factors that can alter the aircraft's trajectory, nor builds “long trajectories” necessary to more accurately predict multi segment arrival/departure times into the future.
ACARS—ARINC Communications Addressing and Reporting System is a discreet data link system between the aircraft and ground personnel. This provides very basic email capability between the aircraft and a limited sets of operational data and personnel. Functionality from this data link source includes operational data, weather data, pilot to dispatcher communication, pilot to aviation authority communication, airport data, OOOI data, etc.
Air Traffic Control System (ATC)—A system to assure the safe separation of moving aircraft operated by an aviation regulatory authority. In numerous countries, this system is managed by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). In the United States the federal agency responsible for this task is the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
Arrival/Departure Times—Refers to the time an aircraft was, or will be at a certain trajectory. While the arrival/departure time at the gate is commonly the main point of interest for most aviation entities and airline customers, the arrival/departure time referred to herein can refer to the arrival/departure time at or from any point along the aircraft's present or long trajectory.
Arrival/departure fix/Cornerpost (FIG. 2)—At larger airports, the aviation regulatory authorities have instituted structured arrival/departure points that force all arrival/departure aircraft over geographic points (typically four for arrivals and four for departures). These are typically 30 to 50 miles from the arrival/departure airport and are separated by approximately 90 degrees. The purpose of these arrival/departure points or cornerposts is so that the controllers can better sequence the aircraft, while keeping them separate from the other arrival/departure aircraft flows. In the future it may be possible to move these merge points closer to the airport, or eliminate them all together. As described herein, the arrival/departure cornerpost referred to herein will be one of the points where the aircraft merge. Additionally, besides an airport, as referred to herein, an arrival/departure fix/cornerpost can refer to entry/exit points to any system resource, e.g., a runway, an airport gate, a section of airspace, a CAA control sector, a section of the airport ramp, etc. Further, an arrival/departure fix/cornerpost can represent an arbitrary point in space where an aircraft is or will be at some past, present or future time.
Aviation Authority—Also aviation regulatory authority. This is the agency responsible for aviation safety along with the separation of aircraft when they are moving. Typically, this is a government-controlled agency, but a recent trend is to privatize this function. In the US, this agency is the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). In numerous other countries, it is referred to as the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).
Block Time—The time from aircraft gate departure to aircraft gate arrival. This can block time (scheduled departure time to scheduled arrival/departure time as posted in the airline schedule) or actual block time (time difference between when the aircraft door is closed and the brakes are released at the departure station until the brakes are set and the door is open at the arrival station).
Figure of Merit (FOM)—A method of evaluating the accuracy of a piece of data, data set, calculation, etc. It also is a method to represent the confidence, i.e. degree of certainty, the system has in the trajectory and/or prediction.
Goal Function—a method or process of measurement of the degree of attainment for a set of specified goals. A method or process to evaluate the current scenario against a set of specified goals, generate various alternative scenarios, with these alternative scenarios, along with the current scenario then being assessed with the goal attainment assessment process to identify which of these alternative scenarios will yield the highest degree of attainment for a set of specified goals. The purpose of function is to find a solution that “better” the specified goals (as defined by the operator) than the present condition and determine if it is worth (as defined by the operator) changing to the “better” condition/solution. This is always true, whether it is the initial run or one generated by the monitoring system. In the case of the monitoring system (and this could even be set up for the initial condition/solution as well), it is triggered by some defined difference (as defined by the operator) between the how well the present condition meets the specified goals versus some “better” condition/solution found by the present invention. Once the Goal function finds a “better” condition/solution that it determines is worth changing to, a process translates said “better” condition/solution into some doable task and then communicates this to the interested parties, and then monitors the new current condition to determine if any “better” condition/solution can be found and is worth changing again.
Hub Airline—An airline operating strategy whereby passengers from various cities (spokes) are funneled to an interchange point (hub) and connect flight to various other cities. This allows the airlines to capture greater amounts of traffic flow to and from cities they serve, and offers smaller communities one-stop access to literally hundreds of nationwide and worldwide destinations.
Long-Trajectory—The ability to look beyond the current flight segment to build the trajectory of an aircraft or other aviation asset (i.e., gate) for x hours (typically 24) into the future. This forward looking, long-trajectory may include numerous flight segments for an aircraft, with the taxi time and the time the aircraft is parked at the gate included in this trajectory. For example, given an aircraft's current position and other factors, it is predicted to land at ORD at 08:45, be at the gate at 08:52, depart the gate at 09:35, takeoff at 09:47 and land at DCA at 11:20 and be at the DCA gate at 11:34. At each point along this long trajectory, numerous factors can influence and change the trajectory. The more accurately the present invention can predict these factors, the more accurately the prediction of each event along the long trajectory. Further, within the present invention, the long-trajectory is used to predict the location of an aircraft at any point x hours into the future.
A long-trajectory prediction step (1004) that utilizes the algorithms previously used in the initial through fourth prediction steps so as to extend the predicted trajectory to encompass the planned flight's other, future flight legs or segments, the aircraft's long- trajectory prediction encompassing the arrival/departure times for the aircraft and other assets (e.g., gates) for “x” hours into the future,
As also discussed above, the order of the aircraft, or their sequencing, as they approach the airport can also affect a runway's arrival/departure capacity. The present invention, through a more system oriented prediction process, predicts the arrival sequence for a set of arrival aircraft into an airport. With this information, a CAA/airline can potentially alter the arrival sequence so as to maximize a runway's arrival/departure capacity; as found in the inventors Regular application Ser. No. 09/861,262, filed May 18, 2001 and entitled “Method And System For Aircraft Flow Management By Airlines/Aviation Authorities.”
To provide a better understanding of how this trajectory building process may be performed, consider the following. An aircraft trajectory is a four dimensional representation (latitude, longitude, altitude as a function of time) of an aircraft's flight profile. This may be represented as a chronological listing of the aircraft's constant speed, great-arc segments (with altitude block). Various boundary crossings of these arc segments can then be identified with defined airspace boundaries (such as ATC control centers and sectors). Fix time estimation (FTE) techniques are then used to predict the time when these boundary crossing events on the various arc segments will occur (fix time estimation takes into account wind speed and it is accomplished by integrating the equations of motion for a given constant airspeed). These techniques involve assuming that the time when a “coordination fix” is reached by the flight is known, and then computing the time to the other fixes in both directions using the most up to date value of the flight's cruise speed (true airspeed, corrected for winds).
Turning this around to a forward looking prediction process, see FIG. 15, once the present invention receives and analyzes the data of the late arrival of the crew into MSP, it then calculates the necessary crew rest requirement, predicts the late MSP departure (1201—30 minutes) and ORD arrival (1202—25 minutes), the late ORD departure (1203—23 minutes), the enroute weather delay (1204—17 minutes) and RDU arrival (1205—36 minutes) and finally the late RDU departure (1206—42 minutes). At each step in this process, the present invention would also factor in numerous other factors that could affect the aircraft's trajectory, ATC actions (1207—9 minutes from RDU to ORD which could be caused by the departure demand at the runways, possible local airborne departure constraints again based on departure loads, possible enroute constraints, the arrival demand at the destination airport), the time enroute requirement, the distance between the landing runway and the arrival gate, arrival gate availability and weather throughout the movement of the flight.
When weather at an airport is expected to deteriorate to the point such that the rate of arrival/departures is lowered, the aviation authorities will “ground hold” aircraft at their departure points. Because of rapidly changing conditions and the difficulty of communicating to numerous aircraft that are being held on the ground, it can happen that announced one to two hour delays can be seen to be unnecessary within fifteen minutes of their initial announcement. Also, because of various uncertainties, it may happen that by the time the aircraft arrives at its destination, the constraint to the airport's arrival/departure rate is long since past and the aircraft is sped up for arrival/departure. An example of this scenario occurs when a rapidly moving thunderstorm clears the airport hours before the aircraft is scheduled to land.
The present invention helps avoid such needless “ground holds” by continually calculating arrival/departure times based on a large set of parameters, including the predicted changing weather conditions.
In the current art, the aircraft would enter holding, and after 35 to 40 minutes, the pilot realizing that there is not enough fuel to hold any longer, will divert to another airport. Using the present invention, prior to approaching the airport and entering the holding stack, the pilot/airline would see the trajectory showing that there was not enough fuel for normal sequencing into the destination, and as such, the trajectory prediction in the present invention could show that the aircraft had no possible way to land at the intended destination (i.e., the display might show the word “Divert” predicted landing time or the present invention could show the trajectory extending to the declared diversion airport as declared in the flight plan sent to the CAA prior to departure). The point is that the information that the aircraft had zero probability of landing at the original destination is calculated and provided to the operator/airline/pilot.
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EstkowskiAviation advisory* Cited by examinerClassifications U.S. Classification701/120, 342/455, 340/961, 701/5International ClassificationG08G5/00Cooperative ClassificationG08G5/0043European ClassificationG08G5/00DLegal EventsDateCodeEventDescriptionOct 12, 2012SULPSurcharge for late paymentYear of fee payment: 7Oct 12, 2012FPAYFee paymentYear of fee payment: 8Apr 1, 2008FPAYFee paymentYear of fee payment: 4RotateOriginal ImageGoogle Home - Sitemap - USPTO Bulk Downloads - Privacy Policy - Terms of Service - About Google Patents - Send FeedbackData provided by IFI CLAIMS Patent Services