Modelling of aircraft rotation in a multiple airport environment

Arrival/departure punctuality of an aircraft at an airport is significantly affected by upstream flight operation through aircraft rotation (AR) between airports. This paper develops a model to simulate AR in a multiple airport environment. The AR model consists of two sub-models: the aircraft turnaround model, which describes the operation of turnaround activities at an airport; and the enroute model, which simulates the enroute flight time of an aircraft in the airspace between two airports. Delays due to operational disruptions from aircraft turnaround activities are modeled by stochastic variables in the aircraft turnaround model. Uncertainties from schedule punctuality are modeled by probability density functions in the enroute model. A case study using real schedule and punctuality data from a European schedule airline validates the effectiveness of the proposed AR model. Comparison between simulation results and observation data showed that the modeling performance of the AR model was good in terms of departure/arrival punctuality, the mean departure/arrival delay and the expected departure/arrival delay of segments in the rotation schedule. The proposed model can be applied by airlines to evaluate the impact of changes to AR schedules.