Model Estimates of Traffic Reduction in Storm Impacted En Route Airspace

An understanding of convective weather impacts on en route airspace capacity is a first step toward development of predictive tools to support both tactical and strategic routing decisions in storm-impacted airspace. This study presents a model for traffic reductions in en route sectors that result from convective weather impacts. A model to predict the impact of convective weather on en route traffic, Traffic Normalized Fractional Route Availability (TNFRA), combines Weather Avoidance Fields (WAF) from the Convective Weather Avoidance Model (CWAM) with a model for route usage in air traffic control (ATC) sectors. The model estimates the number of flights that will be able to pass through convective weather in a given sector. Results show that TNFRA provides a relatively unbiased estimate of sector traffic when compared to actual operations during high impact – convective weather events.