NASA 1996 SBIR Phase I

PROJECT TITLE : : Terrain Transport Airframe Technologies

TECHNICAL ABSTRACT (LIMIT 200 WORDS)

One of the serious safety issues in commercial air transport is controlled flight into terrain (CFIT). There have been three high profile, fatal accidents of this type in the past year. All could have been avoided if timely warning of an impending hazard had been presented to the pilot.

TSC proposes a lowcost, innovative set of modifications to an existing X-band weather radar on-board commercial aircraft and proposed for the SST that will add the capability to sense and display terrain or hazard location at ranges sufficient to allow safe maneuver to avoid the indicated danger. In addition, this innovation will 1) provide predictive measurement of the aircraft altitude relative to the runway during landing approach and 2) will present a 3-dimensional rendering of major structures as an adjunct to autonomous landing/sensors.

During our proposed Phase I effort we will determine the terrain warning/image enhancement requirements, performance and design for incorporation into a commercial weather/windshear radar. The output from Phase I will be performance estimates and a set of design modifications to be implemented and tested during Phase II. Following Phase II, NASA and the commercial airline industry will have a validated design and a set of tests demonstrating the performance of the proposed innovation.

The proposed technology can significantly enhance the safety of commercial aircraft as well as business and military transport aircraft. TSC is working with one of the major suppliers of on-board weather radars and we anticipate the incorporation of the TSC design into their products.

Carl J. Furchner
Technology Service Corporation
2950 31st Street
Santa Monica, CA 90405

Russell J. Lefevre
Technology Service Corporation
2950 31st Street
Santa Monica, CA 90405