Dynamic sector characterisation model with the application of machine learning techniques

Abstract

The ATC service has the objective of controlling airspace operations safely and efficiently. This control is becoming more and more difficult due to the increasing complexity of airspace. With the objective of collaborating and facilitating the provision of the control service, FLUJOS project aims to develop a methodology to characterise ATC sectors according to their complexity. This paper shows the first results obtained in this project. A methodology is proposed that first performs a statistical analysis of the data present in the flight plans of individual aircraft. The statistical analysis will be used to estimate the impact of air traffic flows. With this, the complexity of ATC sectors will finally be determined. In addition, a machine learning tool will be added to develop a dynamic methodology. After evaluating the methodology with data from Spanish airspace in 2019, it can be said that the results obtained are logical from an operational point of view, and that they allow a fairly accurate classification of the sectors based on their complexity. However, the proposed methodology is still a preliminary version, so more work will have to be done to add variables to achieve the objective of obtaining an even more accurate and realistic classification.