iFly project
1. Project details
| Contract number | TREN/07/FP6AE/S07.71574/037180 |
| Project acronym | iFly |
| Project name | Safety, complexity and responsibility based design and validation of highly automated air traffic management |
| Starting date | 22 May 2007 |
| Duration | 51 months |
| Instrument | Specific Targeted Research Projects (STREP) |
| Thematic priority | 1.3.1.4.g Aeronautics and Space |
| Total project cost | 5 246 kEuro |
| IST European Commision funding | 3 309 kEuro |
| Coordinator | Henk A.P. Blom (National Aerospace Laboratory NLR) |
| EC Officer |
Vu Duc Hoang (as of September 2011) Katarzyna Gryc (until August 2011) Christopher North (until November 2007) |
2. Background
During recent years the ATM community research trend is to direct large airborne self separation research projects to situations of less dense airspace. Typical examples of this trend are the EC research projects MFF (Mediterranean Free Flight) and ASSTAR (Advanced Safe Separation Technology and Algorithms). This trend is remarkable because airborne self separation was originally conceived as a potential solution for high density airspace. iFly aims to develop a step change in this trend, through a systematic exploitation and further development of the advanced mathematical techniques that have emerged within the HYBRIDGE project of EC's 5th Framework Programme.
3. Project objective(s)
Currently, two schools of researchers exist. Researchers of one school believe that airborne self-separation can safely accommodate traffic levels much greater than current en-route traffic. Researchers of the other school believe that airborne self-separation cannot work safely for high density airspace. Both schools concur that for airspace having sufficiently low traffic densities, airborne self-separation may be safe. From a research perspective this calls for a study which evaluates up to which traffic levels airborne self-separation is safe. This is exactly the key aim of the iFly project. For en-route traffic, iFly has the objective to develop an advanced airborne self separation design together with a vision how the well-equipped aircraft can be integrated within SESAR concept thinking. The goal is to accommodate a three to six times increase in current en-route traffic levels. This incorporates analysis of safety, complexity and pilot/controller responsibilities and assessment of ground and airborne system requirements and which make part of an overall validation plan. The proposed iFly research combines expertise in air transport human factors, safety and economics with analytical and Monte Carlo simulation methodologies providing for "implementation" decision-making, standardisation and regulatory frameworks.
4. Description of the work
iFly will perform two operational concept design cycles and an assessment cycle comprising human factors,
safety, efficiency, capacity and economic analyses. The general work structure is illustrated in the figure below.
During the first design cycle, state of the art Research, Technology and Development (RTD) aeronautics results
will be used to define a "baseline" operational concept. For the assessment cycle and second design cycle,
innovative methods for the design of safety critical systems will be used to refine the operational concept
with the goal of managing a three to six times increase in current air traffic levels. These innovative methods
find their roots in robotics, financial mathematics and telecommunications.
As depicted in the figure below, iFly work is organised through nine technical Work Packages (WPs), each of which
belongs to one of the four types of developments mentioned above:
Design cycle 1
The aim is to develop an Autonomous Aircraft Advanced (A3) en-route operational concept which is initially
based on the current "state-of-the-art" in aeronautics research. The A3 ConOps is developed within WP1.
An important starting and reference point for this A3 ConOps development is formed by the human responsibility
analysis in WP2.
Innovative methods
Develop innovative architecture free methods towards key issues that have to be addressed by an advanced
operational concept:
Develop a method to model and predict complexity of air traffic (WP3).
Model and evaluate the problem of maintaining multi-agent Situation Awareness (SA) and avoiding cognitive dissonance (WP4).
Develop conflict resolution algorithms for which it is formally possible to garantee their performance (WP5).
Assessment cycle
Assess the state-of-the-art in Autonomous Aircraft Advanced (A3) en-route operations concept design development
with respect to human factors, safety and economy, and identify which limitations have to be mitigated in order
to accommodate a three to six times increase in air traffic demand:
Assess the A3 operation on economy, with emphasis on the impact on organisational and institutional issues (WP6).
Assess the A3 operation on safety as a function of traffic density increase over current and mean density level (WP7).
Design cycle 2
The aim is to refine the A3 ConOps of design cycle 1 and to develop a vision how A3
equipped aircraft can be integrated within SESAR concept thinking. Preliminary safety and performance
requirements will be developed on the applicable functional elements of the A3 ConOps, focused on identifying
the required technology.
5. Expected results
There are ten expected iFly results:
Autonomous Aircraft Advanced (A3) ConOps,
Human factors of A3 ConOps
Safety/capacity of A3 ConOps
Cost-benefit of A3 ConOps
Predict traffic complexity
Maintaining multi-agent Situation Awareness (SA)
Guaranteed conflict resolution
A3 ConOps refinement
A3 airborne requirements
Overall validation plan