Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jn8rn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T22:15:12.690Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Air Traffic Control Separation Minima: Part 1 – The Current Stasis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 June 2011

Peter Brooker
Peter Brooker*
Affiliation:
(Aviation Consultant)
*
(Email: p_brooker@btopenworld.com)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Current strategic plans for air traffic management (ATM) envisage a transition from radar control to a trajectory-based system. The future ATM concepts are very different in a great number of aspects from the present system. The focus here is on the design of safe systems, in particular the appropriate air traffic control (ATC) separation minima. This Part 1 sketches the historical origins of ATC separation minima and then analyses the safety thinking behind current minima and the issues involved in risk modelling. Why have the critical minima largely remained unchanged for several decades – stasis? Part 2 then addresses key safety issues in the transition to the new ATM concept.

‘Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world.’ Archimedes.

Keywords

ATMSeparation minimaCollision risk.
Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Navigation , Volume 64 , Issue 3 , July 2011 , pp. 449 - 465
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Navigation 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Averty, P. (2005). Conflict Perception by ATCS Admits Doubt but not Inconsistency. 6th USA/Europe ATM R&D Seminar.Google Scholar
Bell, J. and Holroyd, J. (2009). Review of human reliability assessment methods. Research Report RR679. UK Health and Safety Executive.Google Scholar
Brooker, P. (2004a). Consistent and up-to-date aviation safety targets, Aeronautical Journal. 108(1085), 345–356.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brooker, P. (2004b). Radar Inaccuracies and Mid-Air Collision Risk: Part 1 – a Dynamic Methodology; Part 2 – En Route Radar Separation Minima. The Journal of Navigation. 57, 25–37, 39–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brooker, P. (2005). STCA, TCAS, Airproxes and Collision Risk. The Journal of Navigation. 58, 389–404.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brooker, P. (2008a). Air traffic safety: continued evolution or a new paradigm? Aeronautical Journal. 112(1132), 333–344.Google Scholar
Brooker, P. (2008b). The Überlingen Accident: Macro-Level Safety Lessons. Safety Science. 46(10), 1483–1508.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brooker, P. (2010). SESAR Safety Decision-Making: Lessons from Environmental, Nuclear and Defence Modelling. Safety Science. 48(7), 831–844.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brooker, P. (2011). Air Traffic Control Separation Minima: Part 2 – Transition to a Trajectory-based System. (Accepted for The Journal of Navigation, 64)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caruso, M. A. et al. (1999). An approach for using risk assessment in risk-informed decisions on plant-specific changes to the licensing basis. Reliability Engineering and System Safety. 63, 231–242.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chaboud, T., Hunter, R., Hustache, J. C., Mahlich, S. and Tullett, P. (2000). Investigating air traffic complexity: Potential impacts on workload and costs (European Experimental Centre Note No. 11/00). Brussels, Belgium: Eurocontrol., USA.Google Scholar
de Jong, H. H. (2004). Guidelines for the identification of hazards: How to make unimaginable hazards imaginable? Eurocontrol Contract, NLR-CR-2004-094. http://www.nlr-atsi.nl/eCache/ATS/13/416.pdf.Google Scholar
FAA [Federal Aviation Administration] (2000). Introduction to TCAS II Version 7. November, 2000 USA Department of Transportation, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
FAA RADEC [Federal Aviation Administration Research, Engineering and Development Advisory Committee] (2006). Separation Standards Working Group Final Report September 20, 2006.Google Scholar
FAA/Eurocontrol (1998). A Concept Paper for Separation Safety Modeling An FAA/Eurocontrol Cooperative Effort on Air Traffic Modeling for Separation Standards http://www.faa.gov/asd/ia-or/pdf/cpcomplete.pdf.Google Scholar
Helton, J. C. and Burmaster, D. E. (eds.) (1996). Guest editorial: Treatment of aleatory and epistemic uncertainty in performance assessments for complex systems. Reliability Engineering and System Safety. 54, 91–258.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
ICAO (1998). Manual on Airspace Planning Methodology for the Determination of Separation Minima. ICAO Doc 9689-AN/953, 63–65.Google Scholar
Kirwan, B., Gibson, W. H. and Hickling, B. (2008). Human error data collection as a precursor to the development of a human reliability assessment capability in air traffic management. Reliability Engineering & System Safety 93, 217–233.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kirwan, B., Kennedy, R., Taylor-Adams, S. and Lambert, B. (1997). The validation of three human reliability quantification techniques, THERP, HEART and JHEDI: Part II – results of validation exercise. Applied ergonomics 28(1), 17–25.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kiureghian, A. D. and Ditlevsen, O. (2009). Aleatory or epistemic? Does it matter? Structural Safety. 31, 105–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koornstra, M. J. (2009). Risk-adaptation theory. Transportation Research Part F. 12, 77–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lacagnina, M. (2009). Midair over the Amazon. AeroSafety World. February 11–15.Google Scholar
Loft, S., Sanderson, P., Neal, A. and Mooij, M. (2007). Modeling and Predicting Mental Workload in En Route Air Traffic Control: Critical Review and Broader Implications. Human Factors 49(3), 376–399.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Magill, S. (1998). Effect of direct routing on air traffic control capacity. 2nd USA/Europe Air Traffic Management R&D Seminar Orlando, 1st – 4th December 1998.Google Scholar
Moek, G. and Harrison, D. (1992). European Studies to Investigate the Feasibility of Using 1000 ft Vertical Separation Minima Above FL290, Part II, Precision Radar Data Analysis and Collision Risk Assessment. The Journal of Navigation. 45, 91–106.Google Scholar
Mohaghegh, Z., Kazemi, R., and Mosleh, A. (2009). Incorporating organizational factors into probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) of complex socio-technical systems: a hybrid technique formalization. Reliability Engineering and System Safety. 94, 1000–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morgan, M. G., Dowlatabadi, H., Henrion, M., Keith, D., Lempert, R., McBride, S., Small, M., Wilbanks, T., (eds.) 2009. Best Practice Approaches for Characterizing, Communicating, and Incorporating Scientific Uncertainty in Decision making, Final Report, Synthesis and Assessment Product 5.2, CCSP, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Washington D.C. Available at http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap5-2/final-report/default.htm.Google Scholar
Mosquera-Benitez, D., Groskreutz, A. R., Fucke, L. (2009). Separation Minima Model: How Changes in Contributing Factors Could Affect Current Standards. USA & Europe 8th ATM R&D Seminar, Julio 2009, Napa, California.Google Scholar
National Transportation Safety Board (2008). U.S. Summary Comments on the Draft Final Report of the Aircraft Accident Involving PR-GTD and N600XL, 29 September 2006. http://www.ntsb.gov/Aviation/Brazil-CENIPA/US_Summary_Comments.pdf.Google Scholar
NUREG [U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission] (2009). Guidance on the Treatment of Uncertainties Associated with PRAs in Risk-Informed Decision Making. NUREG-1855, Vol. 1, March 2009. http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/nuregs/staff/sr1855/v1/sr1855v1.pdf.Google Scholar
Parry, G. W. (1996). The Characterization of Uncertainty in Probabilistic Risk Assessment of Complex Systems. Reliability Engineering and System Safety. 54(2–3), 119–126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pawlak, W. S., Brinton, C. R., Crouch, K., Lancaster, K. M. (1996). A Framework for the Evaluation of Air Traffic Control Complexity, Proceedings of the AIAA Guidance Navigation and Control Conference, San Diego, CA.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quine, W. V. (1987). Quiddities: an intermittently philosophical Dictionary. Bellknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., USA.Google Scholar
Reich, P. G. (1966). Analysis of long-range air traffic systems: separation standards. The Journal of Navigation. 19, 88–98; 169–193; 331–347.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reynolds, T. G. and Hansman, R. J. (2001). Analysis of Aircraft Separation Minima using a Surveillance State Vector Approach, Air Transportation Systems Engineering, Donohue, G. L. & Zellweger, A. G. (Eds.), Vol. 193, Progress in Astronautics and Aeronautics, AIAA, 2001, Chapter 34, 563–582.Google Scholar
Shakarian, A, and Haraldsdottir, A. (2001). Required Total System Performance and Results of a Short Term Conflict Alert Simulation Study. 4th US/Europe Air Traffic Management R&D Seminar, Santa Fe, December 3–7, 2001.Google Scholar
Simpson, R. W. (1998). Structuring Criteria for automated separation assurancez. 2nd USA/Europe Air Traffic Management R&D Seminar.Google Scholar
SR [Eurocontrol Safety Regulation Commission] (2005). EAM 2/GUI 8: Guidelines on the Systemic Occurrence Analysis Methodology (SOAM). Eurocontrol.Google Scholar