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A robust guidance system for aircraft approach and landing
Abstract
Aircraft approach and landing are very demanding and risky operational phases compared to other routine flight phases. Statistics show that large percentages of aircraft accidents, especially general aviation (GA) aircraft, occur during these phases. Several display methods and intelligent systems have been developed to improve safety. But these systems do not provide the guidance commands needed to help pilots capture and track the approach path. The purpose of this research is to develop a guidance system (GS) to assist pilots during approach and landing. This GS consists of three modules: the Guidance Manager (GM), the Guidance Executive (GE) and the Guidance Display (GD). Modular design allows parallel development of these modules and the GS is easy to maintain because each module is independent of all others. The GM is a rule based system. It determines the guidance direction and the whole system operates according to a stored database. It also calculates part of the guidance data in real-time to meet the requirements of the operating environment. GE uses a reference direction and a system status data provided by GM to generate lateral and vertical guidance commands from their respective guidance laws. Yaw rate and rate of change of flight path angle are the lateral and vertical guidance measures of merit, respectively. The yaw rate guidance command is converted into the required control stick's movement by a lateral guidance command follower (LGCF). The GD shows required stick movement and the suggested rate of change of flight path angle to the pilots. Arrows are selected as guidance symbols because the direction and the required aggressiveness of control can be presented simply by the shape and the length of the arrows. The sensitivity of the guidance hymnology is adequate to deliver precise guidance messages without annoying the pilots. Pilot evaluations of the GS show that workload is reduced and situational awareness is increased with the GS. The GS also makes capturing the localizer and tracking the approach path easier. Under low visibility and windy conditions, the lateral: vertical, and course deviation errors from the approach path are up to ten times smaller when compared to sorties flown without the GS.
Description
Due to the character of the original source materials and the nature of batch digitization, quality control issues may be present in this document. Please report any quality issues you encounter to digital@library.tamu.edu, referencing the URI of the item.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 85-94).
Issued also on microfiche from Lange Micrographics.
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Citation
Yu, Ren-Jye (1999). A robust guidance system for aircraft approach and landing. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /ETD -TAMU -1999 -THESIS -Y9.
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