Malmo, Francesco (2015) INITIAL ISSUES ABOUT AUTOMATIC PLATFORM TO MONITOR REAL TIME AIRCRAFT POSITION RESPECT TO VOLCANIC ASH OR DESERT SAND CLOUDS. [Tesi di dottorato]

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Abstract

The safety problem which can arise when a plane encounters volcanic ash or desert sand clouds is discussed. The main aim of Ph.D. dissertation is to explain fundamental principles of a new automatic IT platform, which can monitor real time the presence of volcanic ash or desert sand clouds in the airspace around each airplane; so, this system will increase safety of flights, above all ensuring two very important advantages: - it will allow flight crews to fly avoiding encounters with volcanic ash or desert sand clouds, which represent a severe risk of disaster; - it will allow air-traffic controllers to avoid total closure of airspace, when this one is contaminated by those clouds; it causes, when it occurred, big losses of profits for airline companies and workers of this field. Initially, research was focused on possibility to describe, using inferential-statistical approach, passive scalar transport in turbulent flows characterized by not defined conditions; not reactive pollutant can be accounted as scalar in fluid flow, which they are contaminating, as volcanic ash or desert sand clouds can be considered a passive scalar in atmosphere. the attention of mass-media about the eruption of Icelandic volcano, Eyjafjallajokull, in 2010, drew attention on the social or financial consequences related to presence of volcanic ash in atmosphere,. Then, the aim of a lot of researchers changed because of two reasons, above all: analysis of precedent similar events or models developed to simulate that particular phenomenon post-eruption; the interest of a lot of international scientists about aeronautical problem originated by presence of volcanic ash in atmosphere. So, research studies were focused on an automatic system to monitor real time airspace and to alert air-traffic controllers soon enough to avoid that flying airplanes could encounter volcanic ash. Desert sand represents a known problem for air-traffic and the very significant difference with volcanic ash is the fusion temperature; this feature makes less dangerous than ash clouds for aircrafts. The system wants to monitor also these particles. This system, initially, was based on monitoring of air-routes; after about one year, the precise analysis of Single European Sky ATM Research (SESAR) project played future guide lines up: airline companies and, so, pilots ask, often, air-traffic controllers to fly using Global Positioning System (GPS), just now, and SESAR wants to make this flying way the only one in the next future [1]. The global vision of all playing actors of the real situation is changed: each aircraft became an independent player and all other entities depended on these; this is the actual line research. When all parameters are defined and prototypal test results are favourable, it is clear that the automatic platform will represent a very innovative step in flight safety.

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