Procedural oceanic air traffic control via electronic displays

Abstract

Since radar or other means of active position monitoring are not available over the large expanses of the ocean, oceanic air traffic control (ATC) operations are based on procedural separation techniques. Oceanic separation techniques are derived from the techniques developed for domestic separation prior to the advent of radar. They are heavily dependent upon the use of paper flight strips to monitor flight progress, determine separation, identify potential conflicts, and plan future clearances. The strips are initially printed by the oceanic display and planning system (ODAPS) which provides flight data processing, data communications, and a situation display for the controller. The controller, however, must manually maintain both the flight data on the paper flight strips and the information contained in ODAPS database. These manually intensive tasks consume much of the controller's available time during heavy traffic situations, and introduce the possibility of error due to entry mistakes and increase the potential for inconsistent data. To reduce or remove the requirements for paper flight strips, and the manual markings of these strips by the controller, a system must provide functionality that will replace or supplement the processes presently supported by the flight strips. This paper identifies graphical displays and controller tools that would reduce or eliminate the need for paper flight strips to monitor the progress of an aircraft with its filed flight plan in a procedural separation from the glass environment.