A Technology Partnership for the New Millennium

Future Flight Image in a Diamond Shape

1.13 Airport Surface Safety Enhancement Technologies

 The number of hazardous runway incursions has increased by more than 50 percent over the past four years. In many of these incidents, reduced visibility was a contributing factor. The NASA Aviation Safety Program's Synthetic Vision Systems Project is developing technologies to eliminate runway incursions in any visibility condition. These new technologies will provide controllers and pilots with supplemental guidance and situational awareness information that will significantly increase the safety and efficiency of aircraft movements on the surface.

Cockpit displaying new technologies

A flight demonstration of a prototype system was conducted in August 1997 at the Hartsfield Atlanta International Airport in cooperation with the FAA. Both airborne and ground-based components were integrated, to provide the flight crew and controllers with additional information to enable safe, expedient surface operations. The prototype system consisted of several advanced technologies that made up an integrated communication, navigation, and surveillance (CNS) system. The flight demonstration validated the concept and enabled assessment of technology performance in an operational environment.

The demonstrated technologies included:

  • Airborne Moving Map Display
  • Head-Up Display
  • Global Positioning System
  • Ground-based surface surveillance systems
  • Airport traffic identification
  • Data links
  • Air Traffic Control (ATC) interface
Benefits:
  • Supplemental guidance cues and increased situational awareness
  • Runway incursion avoidance
  • Low-visibility surface navigation
  • Reduced runway occupancy time and improved braking efficiency
  • Reduced controller/pilot miscommunications
  • Improved situational awareness in low visibility

Image displaying runway conflict

NASA Langley researchers have simulated expanded system capabilities and plan to demonstrate these in-flight at Dallas-Ft. Worth airport in October of 2000, in conjunction with the FAA's Runway Incursion Reduction Program. These expanded capabilities include runway incursion advisories in the flight deck through onboard incursion detection algorithms and a data link to ground-generated alerts, a Local Area Augmentation System (LAAS) prototype, and an airport mapping database consistent with RTCA draft requirements.

NASA POC:
Wayne H. Bryant
W.H.BRYANT@LaRC.NASA.GOV
757-864-1690
http://avsp.larc.nasa.gov/Pages/AvSPsyntheticvision.html

 
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Curator: SAIC Information Services
http://www.aerospace.nasa.gov