On the Accuracy of Flight Data Records for Aircraft Mobility Modelling

Inhalt:
Deutsche Telekom and Inmarsat have partnered to create the European Aviation Network for Internet access on board of aircraft. The network is based on LTE. Mobility models are required to properly evaluate and dimension such communication systems. Suitable mobility models for pedestrians, street vehicles and trains exist while only little literature is available on suitable aircraft mobility models for cellular communication systems. A straight forward approach is the assumption of aircraft mobility following defined flight plans and paths. This paper evaluates whether this assumption is true by comparing scheduled flight paths from the EUROCONTROL database fed by airlines and actual aircraft trajectories determined from Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) data from the Flightradar24 database. We conclude that there is a significant difference between planned and actually taken flight paths and therefore propose to develop, fit and validate mobility models including randomness for aircraft in cellular communication systems.