CDTI Enabled Delegated Separation (CEDS) in the vertical domain: Initial feasibility assessment

This paper summarizes the findings of a pilot-in-the-loop simulation which examined the initial feasibility of an air traffic management operations concept for using a cockpit display of traffic information (CDTI) to support a delegated separation task in the vertical domain. In this concept a flight crew is directed to maintain safe vertical separation from one other aircraft during a climb through en route transition airspace. This is one of several delegated separation concepts known broadly as CDTI Enabled Delegated Separation or CEDS. The CEDS concepts evaluated in previous studies have been adaptations of visual separation as conducted in today's operations. Although visual separation in the vertical domain is occasionally used in the current system, it is more of an exception, and visual separation in general is relatively rare in the en route domain due to the high speeds and larger distances involved. The application reported in this study, delegated vertical separation, introduces the feasibility of a visual-like procedure enabled by a CDTI in the en route domain where visual separation is rarely used today, and in a flight segment (i.e., climb) where it is used even less. In this vertical separation concept the traffic can be ahead, directly above or below, or even behind ownship; the ability to achieve visual contact is not assumed and is not required. The separation task is conducted entirely using information from the CDTI.