BaseOps User's Guide, Chapter 17: Editing Flight Tracks

A flight track is a two-dimensional representation of an aircraft's flight path. Essentially, it is a line along the ground that defines the horizontal (but not vertical) component of the flight path.

In BaseOps, flight tracks are defined as a sequence of one or more straight and curved segments. Every flight track has an associated runway or VTOL pad that defines the track's starting location and (for runways) initial heading.

There are four types of flight tracks.

• Arrival - Arrival flight tracks represents the paths of aircraft that arrive from outside the noise study area and land on a runway or VTOL pad.

• Departure - Departure flight tracks represents the paths of aircraft that take off from a runway or VTOL pad and then depart the noise study area.

• Closed Pattern - Closed pattern flight tracks represent the paths of aircraft that are performing touch-and-go operations on a runway.

• Interfacility - Interfacility flight tracks represent the paths of aircraft that takeoff and land on different runways or VTOL pads in the noise study area.

Important:

Flight tracks are used by the NMap, AAM, and RNM noise models. Unless one of these models is selected, the parts of the BaseOps user interface dealing with flight tracks will be hidden. See Noise Models.

To work with flight tracks, choose Flight Tracks from the object type selector dropdown list. Flight Tracks can be added, duplicated, and deleted as described in Working with the List Pane.

To edit a flight track, first select it in the object list, then edit its properties in the text pane.

Flight tracks have the following properties.

• Name - A short (10 characters maximum) name that uniquely and unambiguously identifies the flight track.

• Long Name - A one-line (80 characters maximum) name for the flight track. The long name can be more descriptive than the short name. It is optional: if you do not supply a long name, the short name will be used in its place when necessary.

• Notes - Miscellaneous information about the flight track. There is no restriction on the length of notes. Press the Enter key to insert additional lines.

• Track Type - The flight track type (Arrival, Departure, Closed Pattern, or Interfacility). See above.

• Runway or Pad - The runway or VTOL pad that defines the flight track's starting location and (for runways) initial heading. Select the runway or pad from the dropdown list. Press the Add Runway or Pad button to add a new runway or pad. Press the Go To Runway or Pad button to edit the selected runway or pad.

  For interfacility flight tracks, your must select both a From and a To runway or pad. The flight track location and orientation is determined by the From runway or pad. The To runway or pad is for documentation and error-checking purposes only.

  Note:

  NMap does not currently support VTOL pads. Therefore, any flight tracks used by NMap aircraft must be associated with runways. RNM and AAM support flight tracks associated with either runways or VTOL pads.

• Initial Heading - The initial heading of the first flight track segment, in degrees east of magnetic north. This property is displayed only for flight tracks that are associated with a VTOL pad (for flight tracks associated with a runway, the runway defines the initial heading).

• Segments - The straight and curved line segments that make up the flight track. Segments are presented in a table.

  For straight segments, Angle is zero, and Dist/Radius is the length of the segment.

  For curved segments, Angle is the angle of the curve, and Dist/Radius is the curve radius. Angle is negative for left turns and positive for right turns.

  Length is the linear length of the segment, and Cumulative Length is the cumulative linear length of the track up to and including the segment. This information is useful when calculating flight profile track distances, although care must be taken to account for runway displacements. See Editing Flight Profiles for more information.

  You can change the units used to specify flight track dimensions: see Setting the Case's Physical Units.

  The triangle icon indicates the selected segment. To select another segment, either click somewhere on that segment's row, or navigate to that segment using the Tab key.

  To add a new segment, either press the Add Segment button , or press Ctrl + A. The new segment will be added directly below the selected segment.

  To delete the selected segment, either press the Delete Segment button , or press Ctrl + Del.

  To move the selected segment up or down in the table, press the Move Up and Move Down buttons and , or press Ctrl + U and Ctrl + D.

  When you add a new segment, BaseOps displays the Extend Track dialog box, which asks for information about the type of segment you wish to add. Specify this information, then press OK.

  

  Alternatively, you can use the quick-add feature, which lets you efficiently add segments to a flight track. To add a segment, type a quick-add command into the text box, then press the Add Segment button or the Enter key.

  The quick-add commands are somewhat cryptic, but once learned, they allow you to add segments very quickly. Frequent users will find it worthwhile spending a few minutes learning the quick-add commands. To display a list of the quick-add commands that you can use, either press the Quick-Add Hints button , or press Ctrl + H.

Tip: