Browsing by Author "Van den Aardweg, William"
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- ItemRobust sampling-based conflict resolution for commercial aircraft in airport environments(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2015-03) Van den Aardweg, William; Engelbrecht, J. A. A.; Van Daalen, Corne E.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Engineering. Dept. of Electrical and Electronic Engineering.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis presents a robust, sampling-based path planning algorithm for commercial airliners that simultaneously performs collision avoidance both with intruder aircraft and terrain. The existing resolution systems implemented on commercial airliners are fast and reliable; however, they do possess certain limitations. This thesis aims to propose an algorithm that is capable of rectifying some of these limitations. The development and research required to derive this conflict resolution system is supplied in the document, including a detailed literature study explaining the selection of the final algorithm. The proposed algorithm applies an incremental sampling-based technique to determine a safe path quickly and reliably. The algorithm makes use of a local planning method to ensure that the paths proposed by the system are indeed flyable. Additional search optimisation techniques are implemented to reduce the computational complexity of the algorithm. As the number of samples increases, the algorithm strives towards an optimal solution; thereby deriving a safe, near-optimal path that avoids the predicted conflict region. The development and justification of the different methods used to adapt the basic algorithm for the application as a confiict resolution system are described in depth. The final system is simulated using a simplified aircraft model. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm is able to successfully resolve various conflict scenarios, including the generic two aircraft scenario, terrain only scenario, a two aircraft with terrain scenario and a multiple aircraft and terrain scenario. The developed algorithm is tested in cluttered dynamic environments to ensure that it is capable of dealing with airport scenarios. A statistical analysis of the simulation results shows that the algorithm finds an initial resolution path quickly and reliably, while utilising all additional computation time to strive towards a near-optimal solution.