Flight operation-oriented Tunnel-in-the-Sky design

Abstract

In order to enhance the indication performance of Tunnel-in-the-Sky (TIS) in the flight instrument to assist the pilots' operation, flight operation-oriented strategies for tunnel are advocated. Dynamic driving strategy for tunnel is proposed to generate tunnel data dynamically, which endows the tunnel with a return-to-path guidance capacity. Transition strategy from the current flight path to the predicted path using Clothoid is applied to improve the tunnel traceability. To intuitively support the pilots' operation and reduce their workload, the estimated fight vector, expected flight vector and their corresponding driving algorithms are introduced. Experimental evaluation indicates the feasibility of the tunnel driving strategy and the valid effect of Clothoid transition. Optimal predictive time parameters for flight vectors are chosen by statistical analysis. These experiments validate the operation-oriented Tunnel-in-the-Sky design. Keywords -flight instrument, Tunnel-in-the-Sky, Clothoid, flight vector I.978-1-4244-8503-1/10/$26.00 ©2010 IEEE