Preflight Aircraft Emergency Landing Field Estimation using Optimization

Being aware of potential landing sites in emergency situations, especially when flying in challenging regions, is crucial for maintaining flight safety. Forced landings due to engine failures or potential urgent medical emergencies may require to touchdown outside official landing sites with a higher risk of injuries to the pilot, to the passengers and damage to the aircraft as well as of collateral damage regarding third parties and the surrounding. In this paper we propose a method for preflight selection of potential landing sites using optimization on local costmaps for landing field estimation followed by the determination of their respective obstacle free approach zones. The method is based on a combination of geospatial vector data, digital orthophotos and digital surface models to compensate for inaccurate or missing obstacles in the individual datasets. First a vector data analysis is performed, followed by a raster preprocessing and a costmap calculation. Finally, emergency landing fields and their corresponding approach zones as well as important static landing field properties are assessed. In addition to the functional chain, results of the assessment process are shown.