Online four dimensional trajectory prediction method based on aircraft intent updating

To facilitate decision support in the air traffic management domain, an online four dimensional trajectory prediction (4D-TP) method was proposed in this paper. First, this study outlined the processes of online 4D-TP. Second, four major components of offline 4D-TP were discussed and presented, such as computation model, aircraft intent, environmental conditions and performance parameters. Third, this paper came up with an approach of current trajectory updating by using ADS-B Receiver and the corresponding data processing algorithm. Furthermore, the strategies of aircraft horizontal and vertical intent updating were also put forward for online 4D-TP. And the aircraft intent should be updated while the deviation between the current and predicted trajectory exceeding the pre-defined threshold. Finally, two types of case studies were carried out to demonstrate the performance and effectiveness of the proposed online 4D-TP method. The results indicated that the proposed online 4D-TP method is able to increase the prediction accuracy by triggering 4D-TP while the position or speed deviation is beyond the pre-defined threshold.