Management and Operations Commons^™

Factorial Validity Of The Flight Risk Assessment Tool In General Aviation Operations, Chenyu Huang, Allen Xie, Flavio A.C. Mendonca

Journal of Aviation Technology and Engineering

The Flight Risk Assessment Tool (FRAT) was developed and is recommended by the Federal Aviation Administration to provide a solution of proactively identifying and mitigating risk before each flight. General aviation (GA) operators are encouraged to adapt the FRAT based upon specific operational characteristics. Currently, most safety management systems-compliant GA operators have implemented various versions of FRATs with different operational purposes. However, the FRAT could be inappropriately implemented because of the dynamic operational features of GA operations. The purpose of this study is to explore insights into potential approaches to validate the FRAT that is used for flight risk assessment …

Safety Management System Implementation Planning, David Thirtyacre

Publications

No abstract provided.

Conceptual Design Of A South Pole Carrier Pigeon Uav, Kendrick M. Dlima

Master's Theses

Currently, the South Pole has a large data problem. It is estimated that 1.2 TB of data is being produced every day, but less than 500 GB of that data is being uploaded via aging satellites to researchers in other parts of the world. This requires those at the South Pole to analyze the data and carefully select the parts to send, possibly missing out on vital scientific information. The South Pole Carrier Pigeon will look to bridge this data gap.

The Carrier Pigeon will be a small unmanned aerial vehicle that will carry a 30 TB solid-state hard drive …

Pilot’S Willingness To Operate In Unmanned Aircraft System Integrated Airspace, Lakshmi Vempati

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The interest in Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) use for private, civil, and commercial purposes such as package delivery, inspection, surveillance, and passenger and cargo transport has gained considerable momentum. As UAS infiltrate the National Airspace System (NAS), there is a need to not only develop viable, safe, and secure solutions for the co-existence of manned and unmanned aircraft, but also determine public acceptance and pilot’s willingness to operate an aircraft in such an integrated environment. Currently there is little or no research on pilot’s perceptions on their willingness to operate an aircraft in UAS integrated airspace and airports.

The purpose …

Evaluating Scenarios That Can Startle And Surprise Pilots, Rahim Daud Agha

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Startle and surprise on the flight deck is a contributing factor in multiple aviation accidents that have been recognized by multiple aviation safety boards. This study identified the effects startle and surprise had on commercial pilots with single and multiengine ratings. Surprise is defined here as something unexpected (e.g., engine failure), while startle is the associated exaggerated effect of an unexpected condition (e.g., thunder sound). Forty pilots were tested in a basic aviation training device configured to a Cessna 172 (single-engine) and a Baron 58 (multi-engine). Each pilot flew the single- and multiengine aircraft in a scenario that induced an …

Mc80: Quantifying Effect Of Fleet Health On Sortie Execution In F-16 Fleet, Kyle R. Gladney

Theses and Dissertations

By order of the Secretary of Defense, all of the US Air Force's F-16 units were tasked to improve their fleet health to a Mission Capability (MC) rate of 80 percent, as part of a Department of Defense-wide push to make its Critical Aviation Platforms, and the units that employ them, more ready and lethal. This study uses historical fleet health and sortie execution data captured from LIMS-EV (Weapon System Viewer, 2020) to create a multiple regression model that quantifies the value of increased fleet health, defined as either MC rate or Aircraft Availability (AA) rate, in terms of increasing …

Sortie-Based Aircraft Component Demand Rate To Predict Requirements, Thomas R. O'Neal

Theses and Dissertations

Weapon System Sustainment (WSS) costs are growing at an increasing rate despite the vast efforts to reduce them. Researchers have attributed much of the cost increase to inaccurate demand forecasts for weapon system spare parts. In 2011, the forecast to sustain all United States Air Force (USAF) aircraft was 19% accurate and WSS costs per year have continuously increased. The purpose of this study is to explore a parsimonious change to aircraft component forecasting to reduce costly forecast error. This study substitutes flying hours with sorties for the purpose of demand forecasting. Many F-16 and B-52 spare parts are evaluated …

Resilient Aircraft Sustainment: Quantifying Resilience Through Asset And Capacity Allocation, Zachary B. Shannon

Theses and Dissertations

Decision makers lack a clear, generalizable method to quantify how additional investment in inventory and capacity equates to additional levels of resilience. This research facilitates a deeper understanding of the intricacies and complex interconnectedness of organizational supply chains by monetarily quantifying changes in network resilience. The developed Area under the Curve metric (AUC) is used to quantify the level of demand that each asset allocation can meet during a disruptive event. Due to its applicability across multiple domains, the USAF F-16 repair network in the Pacific theater (PACAF) is modeled utilizing discrete event simulation and used as the illustrating example. …

Under Pressure: Decision Making In Aircraft Maintenance And The Role Of Gender, Stephanie Douglas Ph.D., Bettina M. Mrusek Ph.D.

National Training Aircraft Symposium (NTAS)

In aircraft maintenance, leaders are under near-constant pressure to maintain airworthiness. Every minute an aircraft cannot fly due to maintenance represents financial waste. Decisions are therefore made in a relatively quick fashion. A leader evaluates the situation, identifies a course of action and then communicates this message to a team of technicians. However, gender influences regarding leaders’ decisions can influence team members’ perceptions of those decisions.

The study will measure decision making methods of leaders in aircraft maintenance and the perceptions of the technicians. It informs how gender influences decision making from both the leader and follower perspective. The expected …

Revisiting Cost Index - The Challenge Of Calculating A Precise Figure For Brazilian Airliners, Joaquim Pedro De Albuquerque D'Orey, Guilherme Amaral Da Silveira

National Training Aircraft Symposium (NTAS)

Within numerous possibilities, Cost Index (CI) is the tool that can provide economic speeds and deliver the lowest cost for a given flight. Cost Index is a highly volatile number that shifts its optimum value in several different circumstances. Through the analysis of the Brazilian regulation, operation and infrastructure reality, this paper reviews several influencers that can interfere with the optimum CI value for a specific flight, aiming for maximum precision and economy. A structured questionnaire was submitted to pilots from four of the biggest Brazilian airliners operating under part 121. The purpose of this questionnaire was to investigate whether …

Energy Harvesting From Airports, Deepon Roy

National Training Aircraft Symposium (NTAS)

Airports around the world are primarily powered using the country’s electricity grids, which comes from a large number of powerplants (coal, natural gas, etc.). Due to a high power supply demand by the airports, the sources from which they get their electricity has become non-economical and non-environment friendly.

As a result, many airports around the world have opted for using solar energy grids for their energy generation, in a bid to reduce the airport’s electricity consumption costs. But it has been a slow progress as only a few airports have been able to implement this feature, as their initial setup …

Exploring Dynamic Delegated Corridors And 4d Required Navigation Performance Trajectory To Enable Uam Aircraft To Integrate Into The Existing Airspace System, Trong Van Nguyen

National Training Aircraft Symposium (NTAS)

Increased traffic congestion on urban road networks has impacted the travel time for commuters in highly populated urban centers. Urban Air Mobility (UAM) is recognized as a system that transports the passenger and air cargo from any location to any destination within a metropolitan area. UAM may offer a solution to the problematic issue of automobile urban surface transportation congestion. However, the predicted significant growth in the demand for integration of UAM operations into the existing airspace system in the next 20 years and beyond may exceed the capacity of current air traffic control (ATC) system resources, particularly the ATC …

Applying And Evaluating A Taxonomy Of Resilient Performance Among Certified Flight Instructors, Kristine M. Kiernan Ph.D., David S. Cross Ph.D., Ed.D., Mark Scharf Ph.D.

National Training Aircraft Symposium (NTAS)

Human error in aviation has been well studied, but the contribution of human performance to system resilience in aviation has not been as well explored. Resilient performance is the ability of a system to make accommodations before, during, and after a disturbance to ensure continued system functioning. Resilient performance is enabled by the ability to anticipate, monitor, learn, and respond. Certified flight instructors will be interviewed using the critical incident debrief method. Interviews will be transcribed and analyzed to explore resilient behavior and evaluate whether the taxonomy of success developed in commercial airline operations is applicable to the flight instruction …

Drones Are Everywhere!, Andreas Wesemann Ph.D.

National Training Aircraft Symposium (NTAS)

Drones are everywhere! Using technology to enhance learning in collegiate and secondary school education.

Unmanned Aerial Systems are invading our campus at Utah State University, and we see drones flying everywhere. Using hands-on activities, including design, building and actually flying, students are becoming FAA certified Remote Pilot as part of a new minor at USU. This workshop will discover how this program was created, how the use of active learning labs compliment student programs in all disciplines from journalism to business, and landscape architecture to natural resources. Using examples from the first two years of course offerings, participants will discover …

The Effects Of Funding Gaps On Depot Maintenance Hours, Carlo S. D'Amato

Theses and Dissertations

The relationship between expenditures and readiness level is a topic of interest to military senior leaders, defense resource planners, and the American taxpayer alike. Senior leaders within the Air Force (AF) justify increased defense budgets by pointing to the potential adverse effects that decreased funding could have on military readiness. Resource planners within the AF are then tasked with the responsibility of ensuring that budgets are allocated most effectively to maximize the AF's ability to project airpower across a variety of contingency operations. This thesis investigates the relationship between budgets and readiness by examining the relationship between depot level funding …

Predicting Upper Atmospheric Weather Conditions Utilizing Long-Short Term Memory Neural Networks For Aircraft Fuel Efficiency, Garrett A. Alarcon

Theses and Dissertations

Aviation fuel is a major component of the Air Force (AF) budget, and vital for the core mission of the AF. This study investigated the viability of LSTMs to increase the accuracy of deterministic NWP models, while also investigating the ability to reduce model generation time. Increased forecast accuracy for wind speeds could be implemented into existing flight path models to further increase fuel efficiency, while reduced modeling times would allow flight planners to generate a flight plan in rapid response situations. The most viable model consisted of an ensemble of six LSTMs trained o six coordinates. The model's error …

Quantifying The Effects Of Aircraft Engine Upgrades On Operating And Support Costs, Bradford A. Myers

Theses and Dissertations

As research into Operating and Support (O and S) costs matures, the focus can narrow. This research represents a first of its kind for the Air Force; it is an empirical study to analyze the effects of new engines on fuel efficiency and maintenance over those engines they replace. Within this research, new engines are those with distinct Type Series Modification (TMS) designators that appear within categories of Mission Designation System (MDS) aircraft. The only new engines appear on C-5s, C-130s, and C-135s. The inclusion of retired engines brings in two fighter aircraft, F-15s and F-16s. The data source is …

Hybrid Tri-Objective Optimization Of F-15 Fleet Modernization Scheduling, Richard S. Danaher

Theses and Dissertations

The F-15 weapons system is vital to the Air Forces efforts to obtain air supremacy during conflict. Originally produced almost 50 years ago, technological advancement through systems modifications is necessary to ensure the Eagles lethality and survivability against next-generation adversarial threats. The F-15 Systems Program Office faces challenges to plan aircraft inductions for five fleet modernization programs. Optimal induction schedules are developed using binary-integer linear programming models. Diverse constraints such as manpower, equipment, modification kit availability, minimum operational flight levels, and integration of scheduled depot maintenance reveal that no feasible schedule exists. Two competing objectives representing the value of fully …

Inherent Jeopardy Of Performance Based Contracting Metrics: A Simulation Experiment, Daniel Cherobini

Theses and Dissertations

There is a growing trend across the world to adopt Performance Based Contracting strategies to support logistics systems. Using these policies, contract payments are strongly related to the performance achieved compared to prespecified metrics. However, managers are not always confident on what are the most suitable performance goals to use in these agreements. As a consequence, contractors struggle to deliver the desired performance results, while aircraft fleets experience an increase in support costs. And when the results are inadequate, leaders are tempted to impose even more performance targets to contractors, willing to exercise more control over the support organization. In …

Optimization Of Airfield Parking And Fuel Asset Dispersal To Maximize Survivability And Mission Capability Level, Ryley R. H. Paquette

Theses and Dissertations

While the US focus for the majority of the past two decades has been on combatting insurgency and promoting stability in Southwest Asia, strategic focus is beginning to shift toward concerns of conflict with a near-peer state. Such conflict brings with it the risk of ballistic missile attack on air bases. With 26 conflicts worldwide in the past 100 years including attacks on air bases, new doctrine and modeling capacity are needed to enable the Department of Defense to continue use of vulnerable bases during conflict involving ballistic missiles. Several models have been developed to date for Air Force strategic …

Aviation Maintenance Safety Management Challenges : Thematic Analysis, Tori Kobayashi, Brent D. Bowen

Student Works

Aircraft maintenance is a fundamental and necessary element in any aviation operation. In order to be considered safe and airworthy, operators must be diligent in the way aircraft are maintained and how employees are performing. A safety management system (SMS) is an organized approach by management to include every employee of a company that standardizes the procedures a company will follow to improve safety. The structure of SMS was designed by the International Civil Aviation Organization in order to be standardized across different countries and types of operations. Currently, only part 121 U.S. commercial airlines are mandated by the Federal …

Empirical Analysis Of Trends In Runway Incursions In The United States From 2001 To 2017, David C. Ison

Journal of Aviation Technology and Engineering

Runway incursions, events in which an aircraft, vehicle, or person is located on a runway surface without authorization, continue to be a constant threat to aviation safety. Previously identified on the ‘‘Most Wanted’’ list of aviation safety issues by the National Transportation Safety Board, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has spent significant amounts of money and effort to address runway incursions. Little empirical evidence has been collected on the effectiveness of such efforts. Moreover, the data that are available provide a confusing landscape of contradicting findings. Some FAA publications claim that runway incursions are decreasing while the evidence provided in …

Developing A Taxonomy For Success In Commercial Pilot Behaviors, Kristine Kiernan, David S. Cross, Mark Scharf Ph.D.

Publications

Human error has been well studied in aviation. However, less is known about the ways in which human performance maintains and contributes to aviation safety. The lack of data on positive human performance prevents consideration of the full range of human behaviors when making safety and risk management decisions. The concept of resilient performance provides a framework to understand and classify positive human behaviors. Through interviews with commercial airline pilots, this study examined routine airline operations to evaluate the concept of resilient performance and to develop a taxonomy for success. The four enablers of resilient performance, anticipation, learning, responding, and …

Airport Operations Delays And Possible Mitigation Through Electric Taxi Systems: A Qualitative Case Study, David Cross, Kristine Kiernan, Mark Scharf Ph.D.

Publications

Airline daily departures, not including private aircraft, increased from 25,143 in 2000 to 36,722 in 2017. More passengers necessitate more aircraft and more flights. With more aircraft at terminals, ground delays, based on current airport design, will continue to increase. Systems that allow for reduced aircraft time on the ground will improve airline economics and airport operations, in addition, will reduce airline delays both for departure and arrival at the gate. The purpose of this qualitative research study was to explore the efficacy, from ramp controllers’ perspectives, of equipping airliners with an electric taxi system. Prototype electric taxi systems have …

Assessing If Motivation Impacts General Aviation Pilots’ Persistence In Varying Weather Conditions, Sabrina Woods

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Continued flight under visual flight rules into instrument meteorological conditions is the predominant cause for fatal accidents by percentage, for general aviation aircraft operations. It is possible that a pilot’s motivation or reason for flying will override other safer, more logical courses of action when a hazard presents itself. The decision appears to stem from a willingness to persist in a course of action despite factors that indicate an alternate and safer course is warranted. This research addresses what is currently presumed about the decision to continue flying under visual flight rules into instrument conditions and marries those ideas with …

Needs Based Assessment Of Agricultural Pilots In The Upper Midwest, Andrew Leonard, Cody Christensen, Jessie Hendricks

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The agricultural aviation industry plays an increasingly important role in being able to meet the demands of food production on global level. With a limited ability to increase the amount of land used for food production, farmers will have to find a way to increase yields on current land. Unfortunately, the agricultural aviation industry is at risk of having a shortage of pilots able to operate its aircraft. With the current generation of agricultural pilots reaching retirement, operators are scrambling to find qualified pilots to fill their seats. The majority of operators indicated that when looking for a new pilot …

A Conceptual Framework For Valuating Airline Frequent Flyer Program Miles, Yi Gao

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

Frequent flyer programs of airlines have gradually evolved into a multi-billion dollar business over the years. Valuing frequent flyer program miles accurately and fairly has its practical implications both for airlines and members of frequent flyer programs. As a ground-breaking academic study dedicated to airline loyalty programs, this study aims to build a conceptual framework to guide the valuation of miles. Through comparing required miles for different award types with their equivalent cash prices, this study has successfully addressed the purchasing power of AAdvantage miles of American Airlines when they are used for award redemption. Not only can this study …

Risk - A Multi-Layered Approach, Peter S. Neff

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

This article discusses the relationship between the mandates to achieve increased operational safety and the application of risk management strategies. That commercial airlines must operate at the highest level of safety is mandated by statute. FAA regulation, 14 CFR part 5, outlines the FAA response to the requirements of ICAO Annex 19, Safety Management, by establishing requirements for certificate holders to develop a Safety Management System with 4 components: (a) Safety Policy; (b) Safety Risk Management; (c) Safety Assurance; and (d) Safety Promotion. Safety is a tangible and intangible element foundational to the successful commercial airline sector. A structured multi-layered …

Simulation Analysis Of The Effects Of Performance-Based Navigation On Fuel And Block Time Efficiency, Shlok Misra

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The commercial aviation industry has been grown steadily in the past decade in terms of the number of flights operated and passengers traveled. The Federal Aviation Administration has introduced several technologies and initiatives under the NextGen Program. Performance-Based Navigation (PBN) is one such technology that is aimed at improving the efficiency of the National Airspace System which will improve system capacity and reduce delays. The airlines operate with restrained resources and investments into reducing fuel costs and flight times will directly or indirectly impact profit margins. PBN procedures and routes can help airlines reduce block times as flights will be …

Efficiency Analysis Of A Congested Brazilian Airport Applying Slots Optimization Control: Congonhas Airport Case, Mariana Franco B. Mendes, Rafael Roco De Araujo, Ana Paula Beck Da Silva Etges, Massoud Bazargan

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The current slot allocation mechanism in Brazil, based on the International Air Transport Association (IATA) rules, and its supplementary local regulation The National Civil Aviation Agency (ANAC), displays a few issues and limitations (e.g. slot misuse, allocation inefficiencies). Such issues are particularly present in the case of busy airports that works near their maximum capacity for major parts of the day. This inefficiency problem is generated because of the complexity of slot allocation added to the limited decision support available for the Brazilian system. This study focuses on the implementation of an optimal slot model, based on IATA regulations with …