System for transmitting obstacle alerts to aircraft from a ground based database

Abstract

A system for providing obstacle alerts to an in-flight aircraft has been developed. The system includes a transceiver on board the vehicle that transmits performance parameters of the vehicle and a remotely located antenna that receives the performance parameters from the transceiver. Also included is a remotely located terrain database stores obstacle characteristics of terrestrial obstacles located in proximity to the vehicle. A remotely located computer system receives the performance parameters from the antenna and the obstacle characteristics in proximity to the vehicle from the terrain database. The computer system calculates a vehicle safety envelope based on the performance parameters and an obstacle safety envelope based on the obstacle characteristics. The computer system generates an obstacle alert for the vehicle if the vehicle safety envelope conflicts with the obstacle safety envelope.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.