SBIR-STTR Award

Our innovation offers NASA and the aviation community a robust, extensible data processing and analysis infrastructure that supports near-real-time (NRT) monitoring of safety metrics and predictive analytics. The System Wide Analysis Network for Safety (SWANS) will provide continuous measurement of risk precursors and events in terminal areas around the NAS. With updates every five minutes, SWANS will provide insight into safety margin trends and identify increases in risk events at specific locations. These changes may indicate changes in airspace risk status, and identify possible procedural or other deficiencies. Our innovation provides a data processing, distribution, and display infrastructure for adding other data sources and algorithms to measure and predict risk. SWANS can also accommodate Urban Air Mobility (UAM) and other non-traditional operations and their interactions with traditional flight operations. Potential NASA Applications (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words): The SWANS concept supports several NASA System Wide Safety (SWS) Project milestones: domain-specific safety monitoring and alerting tools; integrated predictive technologies with domain-level applications; and adaptive in-time safety threat management. SWANS delivers terminal area safety monitoring alerting and with planned development will enable predictive technologies in the terminal domain. Potential Non-NASA Applications (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words): SWANS has commercial aviation benefits by giving operators an important, easy to deploy monitoring and analysis tool to identify operational risks. A SWANS capability in non-traditional airspace is also needed by industry, as the FAA has indicated that it does not intend to provide the constant airspace management and safety monitoring provided in traditional airspace. Duration: 6

The System Wide Analysis Network for Safety (SWANS) will deliver up-to-the-minute measurement of hazards and risk events in terminal areas throughout the NAS. Updated with current data every five minutes, SWANS provides timely insight into safety margin trends and detects increases in risk events. These events may indicate changes in airspace risk status and identify possible procedural and other deficiencies. SWANS offers a data processing, distribution, and display infrastructure for adding a wide array of data sources and algorithms to track hazards and measure and predict risk. SWANS contributes directly to the Thrust 5 milestone for Domain-Specific Safety Monitoring and Alerting. SWANS offers near-term benefits to diverse users by delivering in-time monitoring of risk metrics with alerts for emerging trends. SWANS monitors the NAS for medium (days before), short term (hours before), and near real time (minutes before) trends. The SWANS monitoring tool can be delivered directly to airlines and operators for timely use in safety analysis, flight planning, operations monitoring decision making, and flight crew/dispatcher training. FAA safety managers can use SWANS to identify “hot spots” and detect evolving safety trends. SWANS will provide real-time answers to important questions that a robust safety monitoring system should ask: What are the current status of hazard and risk events? How do those conditions compare to normal conditions? Has the number of hazards and risk events increased over the past 15 minutes? 30 minutes? Seven days? Are hazards and risk events becoming more or less frequent? Over what time periods? What are the current and recent hot spots around the NAS? By delivering timely answers to these and many other questions, SWANS meets an important FAA and industry requirement for improved tracking of risk events, and contributes to meeting the NASA technical milestone to monitor and assess terminal area safety. Potential NASA Applications (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words): SWANS contributes to meeting the System Wide Safety Project milestone to monitor and assess terminal area safety margins. Immediate benefits come from assisting NASA’s support of airline efforts to recovery safely from the pandemic. SWANS offers the In-Time Aviation Safety Management System a near-term safety monitoring and assessment system for traditional operations and an extensible infrastructure for integrating non-traditional operations as they enter the NAS. Potential Non-NASA Applications (Limit 1500 characters, approximately 150 words): The FAA has a requirement for a system that tracks many risk events and provides timely alerts when risky events become more frequent. SWANS offers a solution to that FAA requirement. The SWANS monitoring tool can be delivered directly to airlines and operators for timely use in safety analysis, flight planning, operations monitoring decision making, and flight crew/dispatcher training. Duration: 24