Dynamic Weather Routes: Two Years of Operational Testing at American Airlines

Abstract

The Dynamic Weather Routes (DWR) tool continuously and automatically analyzes active flights in en route airspace and finds simple route corrections to achieve more time- and fuel-efficient routes around convective weather. A strong partnership between the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), American Airlines (AA), and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has enabled testing of DWR in real-world air traffic operations. NASA and AA have been conducting a trial of DWR at AA’s Integrated Operations Control Center in Fort Worth, Texas since July 2012. This paper describes test results based on AA’s use of DWR for their flights in and around Fort Worth Center (ZFW). Results indicate an actual savings of 3,949 flying minutes for 624 AA revenue flights from January 2013 through December 2014. Of these, 101 flights each indicate a savings of 15 min or more. Potential savings for all flights in ZFW airspace, corrected for savings flights achieve today through normal pilot requests and controller clearances without DWR, is about 100,000 flying minutes for 15,000 flights in 2013. Results indicate that AA flights with DWR in use realize about 15% more savings than non-AA flights. A weather forecast analysis examines the extent to which DWR routes rated acceptable by AA users remain clear of downstream weather. A sector congestion analysis indicates congestion could be reduced by about 20% if all flights fly DWR routes rather than nominal weather-avoidance routes.