Robust Air-Traffic Control Using Ground-Delays and Rerouting of Flights

In this paper we demonstrate that finite horizon optimization of ground-delays and rerouting can provide robustness to the performance of the United States National Airspace System (NAS), in the event a center goes down. Our analysis is based on a linear system approximation of the NAS. We use the linear model to analyze the degrading effect of a loss of center on the performance of the ATC. We employ ground-delays and rerouting of flights as mitigation tools and propose optimal sequences of these control actions to restore the performance of the NAS. The optimal sequence is determined by solving a finite horizon optimal control problem. Historical data in the available literature is used to derive the linear approximation of the NAS. From our analysis we observe that both grounddelays and rerouting are able to successfully restore the performance of the NAS. We did not observe significant difference in performance between these two methods. However, the computational complexity associated with rerouting is significantly more than that for ground delays. The simulation plots demonstrate that finite horizon optimization for determining optimal ground-delay or rerouting strategies can mitigate the effects of a center going down in the NAS.