Aircraft Punctuality at Arrival Terminal-Area: Impact on Sequence Conformance, Saturation and Cost

Abstract

Aircraft arrival punctuality is a key performance measure of the Single European Sky Air Traffic Management Research (SESAR) target concept. A large source of uncertainty in landing times today is due to the merging of poorly synchronised traffic streams in the terminal area (TMA). The objective of this collaborative study was to evaluate benefits of aircraft accurately controlling their own entry time in to the arrival terminal area. Probabilistic modelling is used to investigate the air traffic control performance benefits of aircraft respecting a Controlled Time of Arrival (CTA) at an initial approach fix (IAF~10,000 feet) agreed up to about one hour before with an accuracy of ±10s, 95% of the time. Results indicate the probability of a sequence of CTAs all being met within a tolerance of ±30s, greatly increases with proportion of aircraft RTA equipped. RTA equipage enables CTA sequences to be met for arrival control horizon times much longer than today with an air traffic controller using an arrival manager. The risk of a busy TMA saturating or having to re-sequence due to bunching at the IAF is reduced by orders of magnitude when all aircraft are equipped with RTA. Extended arrival control horizon times enabled by RTA allow delay absorption by speed control instead of path-stretching resulting in fuel savings increasing (relative to a controller without an arrival manager) from 110±10kg at 15 minutes to 150±25kg at 70 minutes. Nomenclature ATM Air Traffic Management RTA Required Time of Arrival CTA Controlled Time of Arrival SESAR Single European Sky ATM Research FMS Flight Management System TMA Terminal Area IAF Initial Approach Fix