A Parametric Study of Altitude Tracking Performance for the En Route Conflict Alert Function

Details

• Creators:
  Lefferts, Robert E.
• Corporate Creators:
  Federal Aviation Administration Technical Center (U.S.)
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  Air Traffic Control Alpha-Beta Filters Altitude Conflict Management Crash Avoidance Systems Radar Tracking
• Publication/ Report Number:
  DOT/FAA/CT-82/51
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  United States
• Edition:
  Technical Note
• Corporate Publisher:
  United States. Department of Transportation. Federal Aviation Administration. William J. Hughes Technical Center
• Abstract:
  The altitude tracking algorithm presently used for en route air traffic control is a fixed-parameter a-p filter. Altitude tracking data are required to support the operation of the Conflict Alert algorithm which detects potentially hazardous conditions between two aircraft. A mathematical theory is developed to evaluate the average warning time before a collision provided by the Conflict Alert. It was found that the average warning time is not a useful measure of tracking performance since the warning time is primarily determined by other factors, such as the prediction time used by Conflict Alert and the initial separation of the targets. A more significant measure of altitude tracking performance is the variance of the warning time. The variations in warning time will measure any performance degradation resulting from the practical implementation of the tracker; e.g., the accuracy of the time measurement, the computational precision used and the quantization errors in the altitude measurements. It is possible that a substantial loss in warning time will be observed if the altitude tracker suffers performance degradation due to finite precision effects which are well-known defects of recursive digital filters.
• Format:
  PDF
• Funding:
  122-111-200
• Collection(s):
  FAA William J. Hughes Technical Center for Advanced Aerospace
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:c1b7a2135756f4ab6bd4327dd9f694f5928a78c3547aa87adee47d6a3b08807871c235222aaa8f48e85b21e7a0bd6ff397528e266151f56e2489be64b008219e
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/91827/dot_91827_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 5.01 MB ]