Evaluation of Operational Risk Factors at Runway High Speed Exits

Abstract

Increasing demand in aviation sector has increased the need for capacity improvements at airport. However, due to several constraints such as environmental, land acquisition etc. expansion of airports and addition of new runways to increase capacity is becoming increasing difficult. Therefore, airports look to optimize the capacity of existing runway systems to meet the growth in air traffic demand. One such option is to increase the use of high speed exits on runways which would reduce the runway occupancy time of aircrafts thereby increasing its operational capacity. Moreover, with introduction of newer air navigation technologies and reductions in in-trail separation standards, Runway Occupancy Time (ROT) of landing aircrafts will become a critical capacity determinant in future. Historically, majority of aviation accidents have occurred in airports, and it is significantly high during the landing phase. Thus, the increased utilization of high-speed exits may contribute to the overall operational risks at the airport. Therefore, this study aims to develop a framework to evaluate the excursion risk at high speed exists considering different turn off speeds, locations and turn off configurations. The study focuses on computing the aircraft veer-off probability for different operating conditions to assess the relative risks of veer-off incidents at high speed exists due to operational parameters. The framework can be adopted to incorporate risk considerations in planning high speed exits in runways.