The optimal aircraft scheduling model based on network model

Aircraft scheduling is an important factor affecting the operating costs of airlines. Dispatching aircraft reasonably can not only maximize the benefits of the aircraft utilization, but also reduce flight delays. In this paper, we first transfer the scheduling model to the postman problem with the network model. Then, a scheduling model that use minimal aircrafts under the giving flight plan is put forward. To solve the model, a scheduling algorithm based on greedy algorithm is designed. After that, at a deeper level, we take the flight delay into consideration and propose a modified model based on the robustness constrain. Finally, a computational experiment is performed with the data provided by an airline company to show the application of the proposed model and algorithm. Our paper uses the network model to transfer the aircraft scheduling problem to a postman problem, which considers the connectivity of the airlines. It is remarkable that the paper provides a novel method to solve the aircraft scheduling problem.