Engineering topics

Chartrand, Ryan

Publications and source records attributed to Chartrand, Ryan.

4 records

NASA NTRS2017

Benefits of Using Pairwise Trajectory Management in the Central East Pacific

Pairwise Trajectory Management (PTM) is a concept that utilizes airborne and ground-based capabilities to enable airborne spacing operations in procedural airspace. This concept makes use of updated ground automation, Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) and on board avionics generating real time guidance. An experiment was conducted to examine the potential benefits of implementing PTM in the Central East Pacific oceanic region. An explanation of the experiment and some of the results are included in this paper. The PTM concept allowed for an increase in the average time an aircraft is able to spend at its desired flight level and a reduction in fuel burn.

Chartrand, Ryan↗

NASA NTRS2016

Benefits of Using Pairwise Trajectory Management in the Central East Pacific

Pairwise Trajectory Management (PTM) is a concept that utilizes airborne and ground-based capabilities to enable airborne spacing operations in oceanic regions. The goal of PTM is to use enhanced surveillance, along with airborne tools, to manage the spacing between aircraft. Due to the enhanced airborne surveillance of Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) information and reduced communication, the PTM minimum spacing distance will be less than distances currently required of an air traffic controller. Reduced minimum distance will increase the capacity of aircraft operations at a given altitude or volume of airspace, thereby increasing time on desired trajectory and overall flight efficiency. PTM is designed to allow a flight crew to resolve a specific traffic conflict (or conflicts), identified by the air traffic controller, while maintaining the flight crew's desired altitude. The air traffic controller issues a PTM clearance to a flight crew authorized to conduct PTM operations in order to resolve a conflict for the pair (or pairs) of aircraft (i.e., the PTM aircraft and a designated target aircraft). This clearance requires the flight crew of the PTM aircraft to use their ADS-B-enabled onboard equipment to manage their spacing relative to the designated target aircraft to ensure spacing distances that are no closer than the PTM minimum distance. When the air traffic controller determines that PTM is no longer required, the controller issues a clearance to cancel the PTM operation.

Chartrand, Ryan↗

NASA NTRS2009

Wind Characterization for the Assessment of Collision Risk During Flight Level Changes

A model of vertical wind gradient is presented based on National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) wind data. The objective is to have an accurate representation of wind to be used in Collision Risk Models (CRM) of aircraft procedures. Depending on how an aircraft procedure is defined, wind and the different characteristics of the wind will have a more severe or less severe impact on distances between aircraft. For the In-Trail Procedure, the non-linearity of the vertical wind gradient has the greatest impact on longitudinal distance. The analysis in this paper extracts standard deviation, mean, maximum, and linearity characteristics from the NOAA data.

Carreno, Victor↗

NASA NTRS2008

Pilot In-Trail Procedure Validation Simulation Study

A Human-In-The-Loop experiment was conducted at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Langley Research Center (LaRC) to investigate the viability of the In-Trail Procedure (ITP) concept from a flight crew perspective, by placing participating airline pilots in a simulated oceanic flight environment. The test subject pilots used new onboard avionics equipment that provided improved information about nearby traffic and enabled them, when specific criteria were met, to request an ITP flight level change referencing one or two nearby aircraft that might otherwise block the flight level change. The subject pilots subjective assessments of ITP validity and acceptability were measured via questionnaires and discussions, and their objective performance in appropriately selecting, requesting, and performing ITP flight level changes was evaluated for each simulated flight scenario. Objective performance and subjective workload assessment data from the experiment s test conditions were analyzed for statistical and operational significance and are reported in the paper. Based on these results, suggestions are made to further improve the ITP.

Bussink, Frank J. L.↗