Simulation and Modeling of the Air Traffic Over the North Atlantic Ocean Part I: Data Requirements

This is the first of two papers that present a comprehensive study of the North Atlantic (NAT) airspace. This study represents a significant refinement to similar benefit studies carried out for the NAT airspace in the past as it includes factors such as weather, current and future traffic volumes, updated aircraft fleets, and new separation standards. The main purpose of the research is to assess the fuel benefit of proposed changes to the separation standards in the NAT airspace. The results of the research are presented in two papers, Part I and Part II. Part I describes the NAT oceanic airspace, provides summaries of previous research, describes the necessary data sources and the simulation experiments. In Part II, the simulation models are presented and the results are summarized. These results have assisted the decision makers in prioritizing the implementation of different separation standards in the North Atlantic airspace.