Patent ID: 8560149

Claim:
A takeoff ground roll assist system for an aircraft, the system comprising: a runway centerline estimator, wherein the runway centerline estimator generates a virtual centerline estimate for a runway based on coordinates for the runway from a runway database; an Inertial Navigation System (INS) output filter and fault detector that filters navigation measurements from an on-board inertial navigation system, using a runway centerline start point to estimate errors in the on-board inertial navigation system; a centerline tracking estimator coupled to receive a filtered output of the on-board inertial navigation system from the INS output filter and fault detector and to receive the virtual centerline estimate from the runway centerline estimator, wherein the centerline tracking estimator generates a centerline tracking feedback signal that varies as a function of a difference between an aircraft look-ahead point and the virtual centerline estimate; and a takeoff criteria evaluator coupled to the runway centerline estimator and the centerline tracking estimator, wherein the takeoff criteria evaluator estimates a lateral deviation between the aircraft center of gravity and an actual runway centerline for the runway based on an estimated navigation error component, a runway database error component, and a centerline tracking error component.