Computer-Animated Predictive Displays for Microwave Landing Approaches

The safe, orderly, and economical flow of air traffic at congested metropolitan airports can result from the advent of microwave radio guidance systems. By providing aircraft position in three dimensions, these terminal navigation aids potentially allow steeply curved landing approaches that will facilitate unprecedented noise abatement procedures, large fuel savings, and precisely timed arrivals at airport runways. To implement such complex flight procedures will require a combination of semiautomatic computer-assisted airplane guidance and control and radically different flight displays if pilots are to monitor such maneuvers confidently and execute them manually when necessary. Results of a simulator investigation, involving visual guidance and flight-path prediction embedded in computer-animated contact analog displays, show that pilots can reliably execute computer-programmed curved approaches to airport runways with the needed precision in the face of severe wind shears.