NASA, FAA, and U.S. Air Force have identified the need to detect the aircraft trailing wake turbulence generated by aircraft during take-off and landing operations. At the present time, one of the major problems of wake turbulence assessment is the lack of an operational system to measure it in real-time. As a result, FAA instituted operational and physical guidelines to reduce the vortex wake hazard. These conservative procedures put extra limits on airport capacity and efficiency. Scientific Technology, Inc. (ScTi) proposes to develop a vortex/ turbulence detection system including a set of scintillometers deployed in the airport to measure ground and near ground runway crosswind, turbulence, and wake vortex using atmospheric turbulence- induced optical scintillations. ScTi will perform system analysis and design of the proposed system to detect occurrences, location, magnitude, and persistence of wake turbulence. With the simultaneous measurements of crosswind and turbulence, the sensor may even be able to forecast the arrival time of the airplane generated wake vortex drifting to a nearby runway. Successful development of the system will serve as a decision support tool to ATC for the next generation Air-Traffic Management system to accommodate growth in air traffic while reducing the aircraft accident rate.
