Intelligent aircraft noise monitoring terminals

Abstract

Current technology airport monitoring units using, “short Leq” as the data transfer units, allow much more and better data than has been previously possible. With very large internal stores, in the order of 2 megabytes, the new generation of units can simultaneously store raw data elements and full environmental information as well as each aircraft event. The pattern recognition built into the units will allow each noise monitoring terminal on the system to recognize aircraft flying over. Then, by a template comparison technique, it both stores the resultant data and transfers it to a remote hoist for correlation. The terminal incorporates some learning capability to increase the “hit rate” of recognition. Any, or all, of the acquisition parameters in each terminal can be configured from the host using a modem link. In a similar way, diagnostics can be performed from the host without visiting each terminal. Typically, 1 to 2 weeks of raw data and up to 10 000 aircraft events are stored in each terminal. This allows for unattended operations as well as security backup for the host.