Flying free flight: pilot perspective and system integration requirement

Sometimes definitions are not as crystal clear as they should be, and in the case of free flight we had a lot of different interpretations. Considering the evolution of aviation from the first experiments, to the pioneers, and then to a well developed and regulated activity, we have reached a point in which the word "free" has a very modest relation with the concept of "freedom to do something". Free flight, as far as we are concerned, means "to flight according to a set of rules that allow choosing better routings and altitudes, use the aircraft at its best performance in terms of flight efficiency, while at the same time providing an improved level of safety. MFF, in respect to the above-mentioned definition, is a bit anomalous, for its "incremental" approach toward free flight starts with applications that are far from the freedom required for a true free flight environment. Even if this approach may seems logical the conceptual difference between the various applications and the final A5 application are so great that they cannot be compared using the same metrics. In the following, a full overview of what MFF gave us and what is needed to transform this experimental experience into real life operations are provided