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Airspace design: a conflict avoidance model emphasising pilot communication and perceptual capabilities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 July 2016

N. L. Fulton
N. L. Fulton*
Affiliation:
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Mathematical & Information Sciences, Canberra, Australia
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Abstract

Airspace is identified through well defined volumes of the Earth's atmosphere. Airspace control is defined to consist of rules and procedures by which aircraft conduct their flight and by which aircraft approach and cross volume boundaries. Airspace control should optimise the flow of traffic under the constraint that no collision occurs. To date, the design of airspace control has been largely heuristic. Two fundamentally opposed philosophies and designs have evolved over the last fifty years. There has been little, if any, formal comparison of the relative performance of these designs.

A new conceptual conflict-avoidance model is presented showing the need to maintain situational awareness for all conflicts. It reveals the essential requirement for communication channels in the conflict avoidance function. Human perceptual performance is related the required system response to conflict. These human factors can be mathematically related to physical parameters embodied in airspace rules and procedures. The impact of changes in airspace performance due to variations in physical parameters derived from models of the communication channels can now be measured. Use of the conflict-avoidance model presented in this paper identifies serious deficiencies in present designs and postulates that fundamental architectural changes are required to reduce safety hazards and produce designs of sufficient reliability, particularly for uncontrolled airspace. Designs based on stable and adequate communications are shown to be required and are now technologically feasible.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Aeronautical Journal , Volume 103 , Issue 1020 , February 1999 , pp. 65 - 74
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Aeronautical Society 1999 

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