NDLI: Assessment of imperfect weather forecasts on airline and passenger planning

Content Provider	IEEE Xplore Digital Library
Author	Wieland, F. Sharma, R. Zettlemoyer, M.
Copyright Year	2013
Description	Author affiliation: NOAA, Washington, DC, USA (Zettlemoyer, M.) \|\| Intell. Autom., Inc., Rockville, MD, USA (Wieland, F.; Sharma, R.)
Abstract	This paper studies the impacts on aviation and related costs of a snow storm in the northeastern United States that occurred on October 29, 2011, focusing on the question of what would have happened had an accurate forecast been available to airlines and the traveling public at least twenty-four hours before the actual event. Snow storms are remarkably difficult to forecast. In the case of the October 29th 2011 event, snow fell over a larger area than initially forecast, the event moved through the Northeast faster than predicted, and the storm occurred in the middle of the day, maximizing its impact on air travel. A mitigating factor is that the event occurred on a Saturday, a day less traveled than other days of the week. The unexpected nature of the storm caused twenty-nine flights to be diverted to Bradley International Airport (BDL) near Hartford, Connecticut. One diverted flight remained at BDL for over seven hours before continuing to its intended destination. Additionally, all major Northeast airports had reduced capacity, as some runways closed for snow removal operations while others operated under Instrument Meteorological Conditions (IMC) for an extended time. The impact was larger than the aviation system was prepared to handle in part due to the fact that the weather forecasts were accurate only within two hours of the storm's onset in the Northeast. The question we seek to answer is the extent to which the impact can be mitigated had an accurate forecast been available twenty-four hours in advance. To study the question, we configured NASA's Airspace Concepts Evaluation System (ACES) to replicate the day with a two-hour forecast, and a second time with a hypothetical twenty-four hour perfect forecast. The forecasts as well as actual conditions not only in the Northeast, but throughout the National Airspace System (NAS), were provided by the Air Force Environmental Data Cube Support System group [1]. The ACES agents involved in airline decision making, particularly the Airline Operations Center (AOC) agent, contain logic that mimics an airline's decision making logic (cancellation, flight delay, or diversion) given a forecast of future conditions. By providing the AOC agent a two-hour perfect forecast and a twenty-four hour perfect forecast, the flight impact can be estimated. We monetize the flight impact in two ways, one from the airlines' perspective and another from the passengers' perspective. The airline monetization is achieved using standard cost of airline operations as derived from other studies [2]. Passenger monetization is computed using a study of the impact of flight delays and cancellations on passenger costs [3]. The costs are compared, and a classic tradeoff between airline and passenger costs associated with imperfect weather forecasts is observed.
File Size	390714
File Format	PDF
ISSN	21557195
e-ISBN	9781479915385
DOI	10.1109/DASC.2013.6712516
Language	English
Publisher	Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
Publisher Date	2013-10-05
Publisher Place	USA
Access Restriction	Subscribed
Rights Holder	Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
Subject Keyword	Delays Weather forecasting Airports Snow Storms Atmospheric modeling
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article
Subject	Electrical and Electronic Engineering Aerospace Engineering

Sl.	Authority	Responsibilities	Communication Details
1	Ministry of Education (GoI), Department of Higher Education	Sanctioning Authority	https://www.education.gov.in/ict-initiatives
2	Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	Host Institute of the Project: The host institute of the project is responsible for providing infrastructure support and hosting the project	https://www.iitkgp.ac.in
3	National Digital Library of India Office, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	The administrative and infrastructural headquarters of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in
4	Project PI / Joint PI	Principal Investigator and Joint Principal Investigators of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in Prof. Saswat Chakrabarti will be added soon
5	Website/Portal (Helpdesk)	Queries regarding NDLI and its services	support@ndl.gov.in
6	Contents and Copyright Issues	Queries related to content curation and copyright issues	content@ndl.gov.in
7	National Digital Library of India Club (NDLI Club)	Queries related to NDLI Club formation, support, user awareness program, seminar/symposium, collaboration, social media, promotion, and outreach	clubsupport@ndl.gov.in
8	Digital Preservation Centre (DPC)	Assistance with digitizing and archiving copyright-free printed books	dpc@ndl.gov.in
9	IDR Setup or Support	Queries related to establishment and support of Institutional Digital Repository (IDR) and IDR workshops	idr@ndl.gov.in

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