Summary
The optimization of traffic flows in highly congested airspace with rapidly varying convective weather is an extremely complex problem. Aviation weather systems such as the Corridor Integrated Weather System (CIWS) provide weather products and forecasts that aid en route traffic managers in making tactical routing decisions in convective weather, but traffic managers need automated decision support systems that integrate flight information, trajectory models and convective weather products to assist in developing and executing convective weather mitigation plans. A key element of an integrated ATM/wx decision support system is the ability to predict automatically when pilots in en route airspace will choose to deviate around convective weather and how far they will deviate from their planned path. The FAA Aeronautical Information Manual suggests that pilots avoid thunderstorms characterized by intense radar echo in en route airspace by at least 20 nautical miles (40 km). However, a recent study (Rhoda, et. al., 2002) of pilot behavior in both terminal and en route airspace near Memphis, TN suggested that pilots fly over high reflectivity cells in en route airspace and penetrate lower cells whose reflectivity is less than VIP level 3. Recent operational experience with CIWS supports the Rhoda findings (Robinson, et. al., 2004). This study presents initial results of research to develop a quantitative model that would predict when a pilot will deviate around convective weather in en route airspace. It also presents statistics that characterize hazard avoidance distances and weather penetrations. The results are based on the analysis of more than 800 flight trajectories through two Air Traffic Control (ATC) en route super-sectors (geographical regions that include several adjacent ATC en route sectors) on five days in the summer of 2003. One supersector from the Indianapolis Air Route Traffic Control Center (ZID ARTCC) encompassed southern Indiana, southwestern Ohio and northern Kentucky (ZID); the other, located in the Cleveland ARTCC (ZOB), included northern Ohio, along the southern shore of Lake Erie (ZOB). The weather encountered along the flight trajectories was characterized by the CIWS high-resolution precipitation (VIL) and radar echo tops mosaic (Klingle-Wilson and Evans, 2005) and NLDN lightning products. Flight trajectories were taken from the Enhanced Traffic Management System (ETMS).