https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/5672 2026-04-05T03:43:44Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/101262 Title: An energy descent recovery advisor for large transport aircraft Abstract: As the journey of an aircraft approaches its final destination, the all'- craft needs to descent in a way that allows it to lower its energy in a timely manner in preparation for final approach and landing. This is routinely achieved through descent planning and executing the appropriate plan. However there are circumstances, such as but not restricted to those associated with air traffic constraints, in which the aircraft will remain high and fast to the extent that it will be unable to then dissipate sufficient energy in time to land. In such occurrences, aircraft tend to approach the destination airfield hot and high, potentially jeopardising the continued safety of the flight. This thesis focuses on the development of techniques and algorithms that detect exceedances in aircraft energy in the descent and provide the crews with assistance in recovering appropriate aircraft energy states when exceedances occur. A monitoring system was developed to trigger a recovery planner on the detection of an exceedance. The planner first generates a vertical profile that allows the aircraft to arrive at a specific waypoint at the right energy and contracted time and this vertical profile is then used by a plan path planner that generates a plan deviation from the flight plan as and when appropriate. The algorithms developed were evaluated using fast-time simulations to assess the capability of the methods in identifying valid recovery strategies and the expected accuracies. The results indicate that real-time crew support is possible and can contribute towards achieving improved safety in flight operations of large transport aircraft. Description: PhD 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/101071 Title: A runaway collision avoidance and alerting system Abstract: Runway incursions have been a major concern in the aviation industry for several years and this has resulted in numerous initiatives to mitigate the risk of incursion, within both the United States and Europe. These range from awareness campaigns and improved signage to air traffic control alerting tools that are used in order to advise the air traffic controller of a runway incursion. Whilst these initiatives have undoubtedly provided improved levels of safety and contributed to the reduction of the numbers of incidents, up to now, they have not provided satisfactory mitigation to the problem. This is evidenced by the fact that, to date, the United States National Transportation Safety Board still keeps the topic of runway incursions in its top ten most wanted safety improvements list. This work focuses on the cockpit environment and presents a robust and effective method of alerting, to direct the crew into taking the necessary corrective action to mitigate a runway collision. In order to achieve this, techniques and algorithms have been developed capable of reliably detecting the occurrence of a runway conflict and working out a manoeuvre which provides the highest chances of successfully mitigating it. The algorithm and alerting scheme were evaluated with the help of volunteer pilots using Cranfield University's Large Aircraft Flight Simulator. The results indicate that the algorithm and alerting scheme can be of high value in the cockpit and can contribute towards improved safety in commercial aviation. Description: PH.D 2011-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/78602 Title: FPGA implementation of computer vision techniques for taxiway centreline detection Abstract: This project deals with manoeuvring problems encountered during the aircraft taxiing phase. In adverse weather conditions and at night, taxiway and runway markings are less visible posing a greater challenge to the pilots and increasing the chance of an accident. The work focused on the research and development of imagining systems and image processing techniques which can be used to provide taxi guidance in all weather conditions. The system processes images of taxiways and runways and through feature extraction techniques, detects the edges and other select features, such as a taxiway centerline, to identify the path the aircraft should take to remain on the taxiway. A polynomial fit on the centerline is used to identify the ideal path, the heading error and cross-track error. A Kalman filter is implemented to track these parameters in order to reduce the effect of noise. A prototype of the system was developed in the Matlab environment and was tested on real and synthetic imagery. The tests validated the performance of the system in different operating conditions, including low visibility and at night. Tests were also performed on infrared video capture in live trials at Malta International Airport. The developed algorithms were finally implemented on an embedded device (FPGA). These had to be optimized for the implementation so that t hey could provide accurate results in real-time without consuming excessive FPGA space in order to allow efficient utilization of the electronic resources available. The FPGA design was tested with images that were used for testing the prototype and the results were compared. Differences were small and acceptable, thus verifying the operation of the FPGA implementation. Description: M.SC.ENG. 2014-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/78572 Title: Product industrialisation of high-speed multi-vision instrumentation Abstract: These past few decades, electronic product development has become one of the leading factors for economic and technological advancement. This enables revolutionary ideas to be easily implemented for the direct benefit of society. However complexity has increased to a point where industrialisation has become a huge task, usually dedicated to large organisations that can afford large investments in funding, infrastructure and human resources. This can be quite difficult in environments where funds and human resources are at a premium (as in the case of Malta). Description: M.SC.ENG. 2014-01-01T00:00:00Z