Classifications

• • G—PHYSICS
  • G01—MEASURING; TESTING
  • G01C—MEASURING DISTANCES, LEVELS OR BEARINGS; SURVEYING; NAVIGATION; GYROSCOPIC INSTRUMENTS; PHOTOGRAMMETRY OR VIDEOGRAMMETRY
  • G01C21/00—Navigation; Navigational instruments not provided for in groups G01C1/00 - G01C19/00
  • G01C21/20—Instruments for performing navigational calculations
  • G01C21/22—Plotting boards

Definitions

• the field of the present invention is apparatus for indicating the position of an aircraft, and more particu ⁇ larly, apparatus for indicating to aircraft passengers the approximate position of the aircraft. 2. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
• Passengers on commercial aviation flights are often interested in following the aircraft's relative position during the flight in order to determine the identity of landmarks on the ground which are visible during the flight", or for various other reasons, such as simply to follow the aircraft's flight, to estimate the remaining length of flight time, and so on.
• the ordinary way the passenger may be apprised of the identities of the landmarks or the aircraft's position relative to ground is from one of the aircraft flight crew, who either recognizes the landmark or, knowing the aircraft's position from navigation equipment, correlates the position to maps of the land being overflown.
• the aircraft position is, of course, available from data from the navigation equipment on commercial aircraft. Such information is typically only infrequently relayed by the flight crew to the passengers, inasmuch as the crew's attention is understandably directed to their primary flight duties.
• Another object of the present invention is to provide a controllable system for providing passengers with position data so that only those passengers desiring to have the capability to determine the approximate location of the aircraft may take advantage of the system.
• the invention comprises a system for indicating the approximate position of an aircraft relative to a map of the area being overflown.
• the system includes navigation equipment adapted to generate navigation signals indicative of the aircraft's position, which may comprise latitude, longitude, ground speed and aircraft heading.
• the navigation signals are coupled to a system computer which has been programmed with map sector data corresponding to maps of the ground area to be overflown during the particu- lar flight.
• the computer is programmed to correlate the particular navigation signals with the corresponding map sector, and generate a display signal indicative of the particular map sector.
• the display signal is coupled to a visual display for displaying the map sector identification to the passengers.
• the passengers may be provided with a map and a transparent grid overlay.
• the overlay is divided into a plurality of numbered sectors, and is placed over the appropriate map.
• the passenger correlates the sector identification to the corresponding grid overlay sector to determine the approximate aircraft position.
• Block 10 represents the aircraft navigation equipment which is adapted to generate position signals for coupling to computer 20 via line 15.
• One function of computer 10 is to convert the position signals into a display signal indicative of the map sector position of the aircraft relative to map 50.
• the computer 10 is provided with initialization means 30 to provide the computer means 10 with data indicative of the aircraft's general flight plan, i.e., its start and destination points, as well as its expected flight path, via line 32.
• the initialization means 30 may also provide the computer 20 with data indicative of the particular reference map 50.
• the display signal generated by the computer means 20 is provided to display 40 via line 24.
• Display 40 is adapted to provide a visual indication to one or more of the aircraft passengers, correlating the aircraft's present position to map means 50.
• tKe land area depicted by map 50 is divided into a plurality of predetermined sectors identifiable by unique sector numbers, and the display signal comprises a numerical signal repre ⁇ senting the particular map sector over which the aircraft is presently flying.
• Computer 20 is also coupled to audio message unit 50, which is adapted to generate prerecorded audio messages in dependence upon control signals from computer 20 via line 26.
• Unit 50 is in turn coupled to the aircraft's audio system or network 55 for playback to the passengers.
• the aircraft navigation equipment represented by block 10 comprises substantially the same equipment already in existence on the aircraft. The specific type of navigation equipment, of course, depends upon the particular aircraft. It is anticipated that the types of navigation equipment fall generally into two types or classes, those systems
• a further aspect of the present invention is the provision of an audio or visual message playback means having a plurality of predetermined audio or visual messages corresponding to particular ones of the map sectors.
• the message unit may generate a predeter ⁇ mined audio or visual message to the passengers, which may, for example, be an information message describing the landmarks in the map sector over which the aircraft is currently passing.
• a predeter ⁇ mined audio or visual message to the passengers, which may, for example, be an information message describing the landmarks in the map sector over which the aircraft is currently passing.
• Figure 1 is a block diagram illustrating the elements of the preferred embodiment of the present invention.
• Figure 2 is a flow chart illustrating a computer program for programming the computer of the preferred embodiment.
• Figure 3 is an illustration of a typical transparent grid overlay with individual sector numbers.
• Figure 4 is an illustration of a typical map and grid overlay such as may be used in connection with the preferred embodiment.
• the present invention comprises a novel aircraft position location system for aircraft passengers.
• the following description is presented to enable any person skilled in the art to make and use the invention, and is provided in the context of a particular application and its requirements.
• Various modifications to the preferred embodiment will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the generic principles defined herein may be applied to other embodiments and applications.
• the present invention is not intended to be limited to the embodiment shown, but is to be accorded the widest scope consistent with the principles and novel features disclosed herein.
• OMPI which provide position data comprising the latitude and longitude of the aircraft position
• VOR/DME navigation systems
• VOR omnidirectional radio beacons which are dispersed throughout the United States, each tuned to a predetermined frequency
• the first class of equipment is presently found on the larger commercial aircraft, such as, for example, the Boeing 747 aircraft, the MacDonnell Douglas DC-10 and the Lockheed L-1011 aircraft. Such aircraft have advanced inertial navigation systems or the "OMEGA" guidance system, which provide the flight crew with up-to-date latitude and longi ⁇ tude position data, indicating the current position of the aircraft.
• the second class of navigation equipment is the VOR/DME system equipment, which is typically used by commer ⁇ cial aircraft which are designed to make intra-continental flights and, therefore, are able to utilize the omni ⁇ directional beacons which are disposed around the United States. These types of navigational systems and equipment are well known to those skilled in the art and need not be described in detail here. In general, it is understood that these navigational systems provide information allowing the flight crew to determine the aircraft position relative to a particular radio beacon. By distinguishing each radio beacon and knowing the exact position of the beacon and the aircraft position relative thereto, the aircraft's position may be calculated.
• Advisory Circular No. 90-45A "Approval of Area Navigation Systems for Use in the U.S. National Airspace System," issued by the Federal Aviation Administration of the Department of Trans ⁇ portation. Since the first class of navigation equipment is understood to indicate the latitude and longitude of the aircraft's present position, this information is available from equipment 10 and may be readily provided to computer 20.
• the signals generated by the second common class of equipment, the VOR/DME equipment, are understood to generate signals indicative of the aircraft's position relative to a particular VOR beacon. These signals may be provided to the computer 20, together with a signal indicative of the identity of the beacon.
• each VOR beacon in the United States may be stored in the computer memory. From this information and the relative position data, the aircraft position may be cal ⁇ culated or approximated. The aircraft's speed and .heading may also be provided to computer 20, and the approximate position may be calculated by dead reckoning, i.e., making calculations of time, speed, directions and distance to predict the movement of the aircraft.
• the aircraft position data is generated and provided to the computer, per se, performs no part of the present invention. It will be readily appreciated by those skilled in the art that many ways of generating the information and tapping the existing aircraft equipment may be utilized. Still referring to Figure 1, the required capability of computer 20 will depend to some extent upon the types of position data which are provided by equipment 10. Thus, for example, the inertial navigation type equipment is under ⁇ stood to provide latitude and longitude data indicating the aircraft position, whereas the VOR/DME equipment is under ⁇ stood to provide relative position data and, hence, requires intermediate computational steps, correlating the aircraft's position relative to a VOR radio beacon, determining the latitude and longitude of the radio beacon and then perform- ing a calculation to arrive at the latitude and longitude of
• the computer means 10 required for inertial navigation equipment will not have the same memory or computational requirements as required for the VOR/DME equipment.
• there is an initializa ⁇ tion procedure whereby the computer means 10 is programmed in accordance with the expected itinerary of the aircraft.
• the overall function of the computer is to correlate the position data received on line 15 into display signals which are indica ⁇ tive of the particular map sector over which the aircraft is flying.
• the computer will typically be programmed with the particular flight information, as well as the particular map sector information. It is well within the skill of the computer programmer to determine appropriate programs for computing the output signals, as will be described in somewhat greater detail hereinbelow.
• trip data is input, indicative of the trip start point, destina ⁇ tion and anticipated flight path.
• trip data is useful to minimize the burden on the computer, since with this flight information for that area expected to overflown, a defined part of the conti ⁇ nental United States, for example.
• This map data may comprise, for example, information defining the sectors into which map 60 is divided.
• This map data may comprise, for example, information defining the sectors into which map 60 is divided.
• One simple way of defining the sector is by latitude and longitude. For example, lines indicating integral degrees of latitude and longitude define a grid which may be superposed over map 60, with the map sectors each defined by two longitude and two latitude lines. It is then a relatively simple computational step to correlate the current latitude and longitude position of the aircraft to the corresponding sector of map 60 in which the aircraft position is located. To increase the resolution of the system, the number of lines defining the grid may be increased, for example, by defining the grid in steps of one-half degree positions of longitude or latitude.
• Means for loading the data in steps 100 and 105 are well known to those skilled in the art and could comprise, for example, a cassette tape or floppy disk drive, or a keyboard for allowing a member of the flight crew to input data. These steps could be eliminated if the capacity of computer 10 is sufficient to store all information necessary to correlate aircraft position to the map sectors for a sufficiently large area encompassing the expected flight paths for the aircraft, for example, the continental United States or North America.
• the computer initializes the display 40 to indicate a display signal for the trip start point, which is continuously displayed until the flight commences.
• the computer 10 commences the input of position data from the aircraft navigation equip- ment.
• the aircraft's position is determined based upon the position data received in step 120.
• the aircraft position is correlated to the map 60 to determine the appropriate map sector member.
• the display is updated to display the sector number result ⁇ ing from the correlation.
• the computer determines the appropriate audio message corresponding to that map sector and causes that message to be output over the aircraft's audio system or network.
• the audio message unit 50 may be coupled to the network 55 and comprise a plurality of pre-recorded messages, preferably one message for each map sector over which the aircraft will be flying.
• the message could relate some of the interesting facts regarding the pertinent landmarks or town, such as the population, principal industry, date of incorporation, interesting people who lived there or were born there, etc.
• a trigger signal may be provided by the computer, activating the message unit to playback the message for that sector. The message may be repeated continuously until the next sector is reached.
• the computer waits a predetermined time interval, which will typically be dependent upon the size of the map sectors and the aircraft speed.
• tKe routine performs a decision to determine whether the trip is over. This may be the result of a manual data input, or may be an automatic result triggered by coincidence of the aircraft's position with the predetermined destination point. If the trip is not over, the routine loops back to step 120. If the aircraft has reached its destination, the display 40 is updated to show the appropriate sector identi ⁇ fication for the trip destination and the routine exits.
• the particular type of display device used to fulfill the function of display 40 is a matter of design choice.
• the display will be a digital display.
• Several of the units will be preferably dispersed throughout the aircraft cabin so as to be readily visible to the aircraft passengers.
• FIG. 3 depicts an illustration of a rectangular portion of an overlay such as may be used in the preferred embodiment.
• the overlay is divided into individually numbered sectors 51...68.
• a coordinate system may be employed whereby the appropriate map sector is defined by a pair of rectangular coordinates
• the overlay partially depicted in Figure 3 is placed over the map 60 provided to the passenger, so that the passenger may locate the particu- lar map sector indicated in display 40.
• the map means 60 may comprise a book of maps.
• the desired degree of resolution of the system will depend to some extent upon the expected flight altitude. With a nominal six mile flight altitude, and with t_Ke assumption that landmarks disposed with the area subtended by a 45° angle from a vertical line extending through the aircraft will be visible to passengers, then a minimum area having a diameter of twelve miles around the vertical line will be visible to passengers. Under these assumptions, rectilinear sectors should have at least twenty-four miles between their boundaries. With good visibility, distant landmarks over 100 miles away may well be visible, allowing use of a sector whose boundaries are at least 200 miles apart. The size of the map sectors is then a matter of design choice.
• a further advantage of the disclosed system is that it is particularly adapted to control which passengers may utilize the system.
• the information displayed by display units 40 does not inform the viewer of the location of the aircraft unless the viewer has access to a map and grid overlay.
• the system is easily adaptable to produce revenue, for example, by sale of the maps to passengers prior to or during the flight.
• the audio message feature of the system enhances the entertainment value of the audio network headphones which are typically rented to certain passengers.
• a further modification to the system could include a visual message unit, such that a visual message correlated to one or more map sectors could be displayed to the passengers.
• the movie projector or t.v. system of the commercial aircraft could be adapted to the purpose and operated under control of the computer.
• the predetermined audio messages could be gen ⁇ erated by voice synthesis rather than via a recording system.

Landscapes

• Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Radar, Positioning & Navigation (AREA)
• Remote Sensing (AREA)
• Automation & Control Theory (AREA)
• Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
• General Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
• Navigation (AREA)
• Traffic Control Systems (AREA)
• Processing Or Creating Images (AREA)
• Radar Systems Or Details Thereof (AREA)
• Position Fixing By Use Of Radio Waves (AREA)

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• 1984
  • 1984-08-14 JP JP50395984A patent/JPS60502000A/ja active Pending
  • 1984-08-14 WO PCT/US1984/001308 patent/WO1985000911A1/en not_active Application Discontinuation
  • 1984-08-14 BR BR8407020A patent/BR8407020A/pt unknown
  • 1984-08-14 EP EP19840903896 patent/EP0153408A4/en not_active Withdrawn
  • 1984-08-14 AU AU35545/84A patent/AU3554584A/en not_active Abandoned

Patent Citations (2)

Non-Patent Citations (1)

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