Tracking all Movement: MKE first with ASDE-X system

The Aircraft Landing Lights to Enhance Runway Traffic Safety (ALLERTS) project addresses a recommendation of the Runway Incursion Joint Safety Implementation Team to develop Standard Operating Procedures for aircraft taxi operations specifically related to aircraft lighting.

The purpose of the ALLERTS project is to investigate the safety effects of using aircraft exterior lighting to convey messages in the airport environment. Two specific procedures are being explored: the use of landing lights to indicate that aircraft are cleared to depart and the use of all exterior lights to indicate that aircraft are crossing the active runway. The objective being to determine whether standardizing the use of aircraft lighting will reduce runway incursions and accidents, and increase pilot situational awareness.

The experiment is being conducted in the B747-400 flight simulation at SimLabs' Crew-Vehicle Systems Research. In each simulation, pilots are instructed to taxi, depart, or land, and researchers gather subjective and performance data on the crew. In half of the scenarios, they encounter another aircraft that makes an error which could result in an incursion or accident if not detected by the subject crews.