This paper examines the potential benefits of transitioning from the fixed Central East Pacific routes to user-preferred routes. A minimum-travel-time, wind-optimal dynamic programming algorithm was developed and utilized as a surrogate for the actual userprovided routing requests. After first describing the characteristics of the flights utilizing the Central East Pacific routes for a five-day period, the results of both nominal and windoptimal routing simulations are presented. The average potential time and distance savings for the wind-optimal routes was 9.9 min and 36 nmi per flight, respectively. When the windoptimal routing flight plan deviations were confined within the oceanic center boundary, the average potential time and distance savings were 4.8 min and 4.0 nmi per flight, respectively. These results are likely an upper bound on the potential savings due to the location of the polar jet stream during this five-day period. Although the sector loading did not significantly change under the wind-optimal routing simulations, the number of simulated first-loss-of-separation events did, which could contribute to increased controller workload.
Moreover, REF represents the first study that discuss the potential benefit from traveling wind-optimal routes instead of using the Central East Pacific (CEP) airspace route structure.
Central East pacific flight routing
In AIAA Guidance, Navigation, and Control Conference and Exhibit
Engineering