Method and system for aerial vehicle trajectory management

A method of managing an aerial vehicle trajectory, said method comprising:

• receiving by a remote trajectory management system (RTMS) information relating to the operation of the aerial vehicle from an operator entity of the aerial vehicle, wherein a default input module comprising data that represents approximated default values for as yet unknown flight parameters used to generate a trajectory provides at least a portion of the information received by the RTMS, and wherein the information received by the RTMS includes an identifier associated with a particular aerial vehicle, wherein the RTMS is a ground-based system that includes a processor communicatively coupled to a memory device configured to store computer executable instructions used by processor to implement RTMS;
• performing, using a consolidated inputs module, a reasonableness check on a consistent data set formed by combining data from said default input module and said operator entity, wherein said reasonableness check determines that said consistent data is within predetermined bounds based on reasonableness;
• predicting, using the RTMS, a 4D trajectory of the aerial vehicle based on the received information, wherein the RTMS processes the received information such that the received information represents performance variations of the aerial vehicle associated with the identifier;
• communicatively coupling the RTMS to an air navigation service provider, wherein the air navigation service provider is a control entity configured to manage air traffic in an airspace and configured to provide airspace restrictions and regulations to the RTMS;
• optimizing, by the RTMS, the predicted trajectory of each of a plurality of aerial vehicles operated by the operator entity to generate a modified trajectory of each of the plurality of aerial vehicles based on business parameters provided by the operator entity and based on the airspace restrictions and regulations from the air navigation service provider;
• transmitting to the aerial vehicle by the RTMS a predetermined subset of the predicted trajectory to facilitate the aerial vehicle complying with the modified trajectory.

A Fleet Wide Trajectory Management System (FWTMS) comprising:

• a plurality of remote trajectory management systems (RTMS), each said RTMS comprising:
• an input specification module configured to manage information specifying flight-specific input data used to generate a trajectory, wherein the input specification information includes an identifier associated with a particular aircraft;
• an aircraft model module comprising data that specifies a performance of the aircraft and engines of the aircraft;
• a default input module comprising data that represents approximated default values for as yet unknown flight parameters used to generate a trajectory;
• a consolidated inputs module configured to combine data from said input specification module and said default input module into a consistent data set, said consolidated inputs module further configured to perform a reasonableness check to determine that said consistent data set is within predetermined bounds based on reasonableness;
• a predict 4D trajectory module configured to receive the specified inputs from said input specification module and an aircraft performance model from aircraft model module and to generate a 4D trajectory for a predetermined flight, wherein the predict 4D trajectory module process the data from the aircraft model module such that the data represents the performance variations of the aircraft associated with the identifier;
• and
• a trajectory export module configured to transmit a predetermined subset of the predicted trajectory to the aircraft,
• where said FWTMS is a ground-based system configured to optimize the predicted trajectory for each of a plurality of aerial vehicles operated by an operator entity, wherein such optimization generates a separate and distinct modified trajectory for each of the plurality of aerial vehicles based on business parameters provided by the operator entity and based on airspace restrictions and regulations provided by an air navigation service provider communicatively coupled to said FWTMS, wherein the modified trajectories are generated exclusively by the ground-based FWTMS.