Implementation and Metrics for a Trajectory Prediction Validation Methodology

Abstract

At the heart of every air traffic decision support tool’s functionality is its trajectory prediction, where a trajectory is defined as the 4-dimensional path of an aircraft. This paper presents a comprehensive implementation for measuring the accuracy of a trajectory prediction in support of a validation methodology. The process includes four main processing areas: (1) parsing and checking the actual positional data of an aircraft (i.e., the aircraft’s actual trajectory), (2) parsing the trajectory predictions, (3) comparing the actual and predicted aircraft trajectory by sampling and measuring, and (4) analyzing the results. This paper presents detailed descriptions of the sampling process and metrics used to measure the accuracy of a predicted trajectory. Several aspects of the analysis and implementation are provided as well, such as inferential statistical approaches and graphical user interfaces to examine individual flights.