PDMSHFT

It is time for a Paradigm Shift in the processing of ATC surveillance data

Williard C. Meilander <contact> has been writing about the need for a paradigm shift in the processing of radar data for the past several decades. He consistently speaks of the need to change to a SINGLE THREAD INSTRUCTION STREAM (STIS) processor. Meilander wishes to refer you to the 1963 Federal Aviation Agency Specification (Central Computer Complex For Engineering Model Of National Airspace System...FAA-ER-606-063), wherein it states (with my emphasis added)...

2.3 Automatic Tracking.- Automatic tracking will compute positions and velocities for all tracks carried by the system. This includes the automatic processing of radar data, both beacon and search, and flight plan data to obtain position and velocity estimates for each track..

Meilander points out that to this day SEARCH radar (i.e. primary “skin paint” radar returns) are not automatically tracked, such as when an aircraft's transponder fails or is turned off (i.e. the hijacked aircraft of 9/11, especially AAL77, which was lost on Indianapolis Center’s displays and resulted in the fact that no one knew it was headed back east towards Washington, DC...it ultimately was crashed into the Pentagon). Meilander points out that the specification from 1963 calls for much better performance than we currently have reached some four-and-a-half decades later!

Meilander states that we don’t have a radar problem...rather, we have a computational problem. With current methods, we do not process the excellent radar data that is received. Meilander stresses that this is a database management problem. Meilander continues to offer a simple, much less expensive alternative. Meilander advises that the '63 spec acknowledged that the ATC problem is, in fact, a database management problem, in that table structures, including data elements, linking records structure, etc, were defined.

Meilander invites you to read a short (3 page) description of the paradigm shift he recommends. Read “A Quick Look at a Real-Time ATC Solution.pdf.”

Wish to understand more? Below is a list of some of the papers that Meilander has authored and/or co-authored wherein he describes this alternative approach to radar data processing. Where possible, hyperlinks to his papers (or to other official references) are made available...

•Real-Time Database Scheduling Simplicity [2009]
•Optimal Real-Time DB Management [2008]
•A new paradigm for real-time database management [2007]
•Overview of Air Traffic Control using an SIMD COTS system [2005]
•Importance of SIMD Computation Reconsidered [2003]
•Tractable Real-Time Air Traffic Control Automation [2002]
•Predictable Real-Time Scheduling for Air Traffic Control [2002]
•The Power of SIMDs vs. MIMDs in Real-Time Scheduling [2002]
•Interarchitecture Comparative Analysis [2001]
•Predictability for Real-Time Command and Control [2001]
•Real-Time Scheduling in Command and Control [1999]
•In Air Traffic Control - The Solution is the Problem in Proceedings of the 1st International Workshop on Real-Time Mission-Critical Systems: Grand Challenge Problems , IEEE, Phoenix, AZ (1999)
•ATC Architecture Computers –Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow, 43rd Annual Air Traffic Control Association Fall Conference Proceedings, pages 91-95, (1998)
•Ground Based Collision Avoidance––Revisited [1989] String together the following 8 links GBCA1, GBCA2, GBCA3, GBCA4, GBCA5, GBCA6, GBCA7, GBCA8
•Array Processor Supercomputers [1989]
•Application of an associative processor to aircraft tracking [1975]
•Surveillance Netting Study, June 1974, Goodyear Aerospace Crop. Contract F19628-74-C-0400.
•Ground Based Collision Avoidance, ATCA 17th Annual Meeting and Technical Program, 9-11, October 1972.
•The Coming of Age of the Associative Processor, Electronics 1971
•Application of the Associative Memory System to Air Traffic Control, Ger 11160 23 July, 1963 Goodyear Aerospace Corp.

Thomas G. Lusch

August 16, 2010