Terrain Database Validation via Speeded-Up Flight Simulations
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Current terrain databases used in aircraft flight management systems (FMS) and terrain awareness and warning systems (TAWS) often contain artefacts, leading to false alarms and a need for manual validation, which is time-consuming and not exhaustive.
Innovation Solution
A method and device for validating terrain databases by generating and simulating aircraft trajectories over geographical regions, determining terrain collision risks through speeded-up flight simulations, and identifying the origins of these risks to validate or invalidate the database.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If manual engineering review and limited tests are used to validate terrain database, then validation process is simple and quick, but validation completeness and reliability are insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The patent performs validation actions before the terrain database is deployed to operational systems. Multiple flight simulations are executed in advance to identify potential collision risks and database errors, allowing corrections to be made before real-world deployment, thus improving reliability without requiring complex ongoing validation systems.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates virtual copies of flight trajectories and simulates them in a controlled environment. By copying real flight paths and reproducing them in simulation, the system can validate terrain database accuracy without risking actual flight safety, enabling comprehensive validation while maintaining operational simplicity.
2Measurement precision
If comprehensive validation of terrain database is performed, then validation completeness improves, but time consumption and computational resources increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses speeded-up flight simulations that compress real-time flight durations into shorter validation periods. By accelerating the simulation timeline while maintaining physical accuracy, the system achieves comprehensive validation coverage without proportionally increasing validation time, thus improving measurement precision without excessive time loss.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent focuses validation efforts on critical regions and scenarios that pose the highest collision risks, rather than uniformly validating all terrain data. By concentrating computational resources on high-risk areas where validation completeness matters most, the system achieves effective validation without the full time cost of exhaustive comprehensive validation.
3Quantity of substance
If terrain database contains artefacts from heterogeneous sources, then database coverage and information quantity increase, but false alarms increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent converts the potentially harmful effect of artefacts and heterogeneous data sources into a benefit by using the diverse data to generate multiple flight simulation scenarios. The validation process identifies and flags problematic artefacts, transforming data quality issues into actionable validation insights that improve overall database reliability while preserving the comprehensive coverage provided by multiple sources.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements a feedback mechanism where validation results from flight simulations are used to identify and correct errors in the terrain database. The system continuously refines the database quality by feeding back validation findings, thereby reducing false alarms while maintaining the comprehensive information coverage provided by heterogeneous data sources.
Data Source
AI summary
A method for validating a terrain database includes a step of simulating flights based on trajectory data for an aircraft, the flight simulations being speeded up, a step of determining terrain collision risks by means of a system for signalling terrain collision risks based on the speeded-up flight simulations, a step of determining the origins of terrain collision risks with a view to validating or not validating the terrain database.