Safety

Integrated Multi-Channel Vehicle-Vehicle and Vehicle-Roadside Communications for ITS

Mak, Tony K.
Laberteaux, Kenneth P.
Raja Sengupta
Ergen, Mustafa
2025

This research describes a medium access control (MAC) protocol to Enable multi-channel operation for dedicated short-range communication (DSRC). In particular, we focus on the challenge of supporting potentially high-bandwidth commercial or infotainment communications between vehicle and roadside in hotspots over several service channels, while concurrently enabling time-critical vehicle-vehicle communication for safety in a separate channel. In our architecture, within hotspots, communication is aided by one of the access points in the hotspot. This access point is designated the...

Proactive, Reactive, and Interactive Risk Assessment and Management of URET Implementation in Air Route Traffic Control Centers

Uang, Grace
Jasenka Rakas
Bolic, Tatjana
2008

The current trend within air traffic management (ATM), as a part of the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen), is to increase the airspace system capacity to operate in diminishing capacity conditions while improving standards of safety. An extensive body of research exists regarding introducing automation into air traffic control in order to create more flexible and cost-efficient operations. The User Request Evaluation Tool (URET) is a strategic support tool designed to assist controllers with timely detection of conflicts; it offers tools for checking the conflict...

Data link Technology for Contingency Management in Super Density Airspace Operations

Jasenka Rakas
Bauranov, Aleksandar
Cheng, Kevin
Monsalud, Andrew
Hayashi, Miwa
2014

Contingency management in SDO is achieved by combining: 1. existing technologies, concepts and software (ERAM, ADS-B, AAR, Biomimicry), and 2. newly developed models (DFDI, Conflict Resolution and Mixed-mode communications for Flight Formation). The proposed concept is demonstrated in 2D and 3D environments in strategic and tactical situations. Improvements in efficiency, safety and aviation operations are achieved by enhancing usage of DataComm in the NextGen environment.

Failures of Critical Systems at Airports: Impact on Aircraft Operations and Safety

Jasenka Rakas
Bauranov, Aleksandar
Messika, Benjamin
2018

Failures of critical systems at airports can significantly impact aircraft operations and cause substantial safety risks. This study develops a generalized method for measuring the impacts of unscheduled communication, navigation and surveillance systems outages on airport operational performance (i.e. throughput) and safety. The proposed method consists of two separate models – the aggregate and the disaggregate model. The aggregate model is a regression model that analyzes flight data, which are averaged per quarter hour and obtained from the Aviation System Performance Metrics database...

Characterizing Lightning-Strike Hazard to Airport Facilities: A Case Study of Baltimore Washington International Airport

He, Yiyi
Lindbergh, Sarah
Jasenka Rakas
Graves, C.M.
2019

As projections indicate, the U.S. National Airspace System (NAS) vulnerability to lightning strikes is growing due to increased severity and frequency of convective storms. Lightning hazards pose risks to personnel safety and may cause power outages, and therefore they can impact reliability and performance of the airport's facilities if they are not appropriately fortified. Although lightning-flash data with high temporal and spatial accuracy is available for the continental U.S., measuring airport facility lightning-induced outages remains challenging. Studies have shown that lightning-...

Characterizing Lightning-Strike Hazard to Airport Facilities

Jasenka Rakas
2019

This article consists of a collection of slides from the author's conference presentation.

Urban Air Mobility and Manned eVTOLs: Safety Implications

Bauranov, Aleksandar
Jasenka Rakas
2019

New propulsion systems, artificial intelligence, sensor technology, and operational system autonomy are transforming the short to mid-range aviation industry. Electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft offer new possibilities for Urban Air Mobility (UAM). However, these developments will create operational issues and safety concerns, especially in the socalled transition period when these aircraft are expected to be manned by pilots, and assisted by onboard automation systems. In this transition period, different aircraft will have different systems for flying. Additionally,...

Airport Exposure to Lightning Strike Hazard in the Contiguous United States

He, Yiyi
Lindbergh, Sarah
Graves, Coolidge
Jasenka Rakas
2021

Reliability of the air transportation system heavily depends on the performance of communication, navigation, and surveillance facilities in the National Airspace System (NAS). These facilities are prone to outages caused by convective weather, such as lightning. Current lightning safety standards and risk assessments focus solely on lightning occurrence and omit the effect of lightning intensity from hazard characterization. We propose methods that incorporate lightning intensity and occurrence parameters to better understand the impact of lightning strike on the NAS using the National...

Dissecting Lightning Strike Hazard Impact Patterns to National Airspace System Facilities in the Contiguous United States

He, Yiyi
Yue, Xiangyu
Lindbergh, Sarah
Gao, Jianxi
Graves, Chuck
Jasenka Rakas
2022

Lightning strikes pose a severe threat to the United States (US) National Airspace System (NAS). Although the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) implements lightning protection practices and procedures to protect personnel, electronic equipment, and structures within the NAS, many lightning-induced outages still occur. To date we found that most research on lightning-induced facility outages has focused on understanding the physical processes of lightning strike effects on aircraft and airport ramp operations. Very little research has been done on examining the overall patterns and...

Deep Speech Pattern Analysis of Controller-Pilot Voice Communications for Enhancing Future Aviation Systems Safety

Jasenka Rakas
Sohn, Sungmin
Keslerwest, Lee
Krozel, Jimmy
2023

View Video Presentation: https://doi.org/10.2514/6.2023-4410.vidIn this study, air traffic controller-pilot speech attributes and transcribed texts of voice messages are analyzed to gain insights into air traffic controller-pilot miscommunications. A Deep Speech Pattern (DSP) analysis is used to convert the speech audio into a spectrogram which is broken down into six sound features: loudness, articulation, tempo, rhythm, melody, and timbre. An initial analysis of these six basic features did not reveal enough...