Autonomous aircraft operations to managed airspace transfer management tool (T-MAT)

The term "Autonomous Aircraft Operations" (AAO) may be used to describe a regime of flight where certain Air Traffic Control (ATC) functions can be delegated to the flight deck. In a mixed-mode environment of AAO airspace bordering conventional managed airspace (MAS), autonomous aircraft may be required to alter their time of entry into MAS for the purposes of Air Traffic Flow Management. This will allow such aircraft to pass between the two regions without deviation or delay while avoiding potential conflict with other aircraft. This paper proposes a paradigm for the airborne rescheduling of inbound autonomous aircraft to help achieve these objectives. For this, a Transfer Management Tool (T-MAT) has been developed where work has centred around the concept of a dynamically-sized transfer zone. This is an extension into AAO airspace of MAS where aircraft will be instructed to adjust their speed profile thus altering their MAS entry time. In particular, the paper concentrates on the transfer from AAO to terminal area airspace. The method uses the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) allowing optimised trajectories to be selected depending on aircraft operators' preferred procedures.