The Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS) is a partnership among various organizations including NASA, the FAA, US aviation industry, state and local aviation officials, and universities. The program objectives are intend to reduce travel times by providing high-speed, safe travel alternatives by making use of small aircraft and underused small airports throughout the nation. A major component of the SATS program is the Smart Landing Facility (SLF). The SLF is a small airport that has been upgraded to handle SATS traffic. One of the services needed at SLFs is air surveillance of the airspace surrounding it. This thesis researches the different surveillance techniques available for use at the SLFs. The main focuses of this paper are an evaluation of the Traffic Alert and Collision Avoidance System (TCAS) when used as a ground sensor at SLFs and the design of a Position and Identification Reporting Beacon (PIRB). The use of the TCAS ground sensor is modeled in Matlab and the results of that model are discussed. The PIRB is a new system that can be used in conjunction with the Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) system or independently to provide position information for all aircraft using GPS based positioning. / Master of Science

The Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS) is a partnership between the FAA, the NASA, US aviation companies, universities and state and local aviation officials. The purpose of SATS is to develop a system to handle future increase in Air Traffic, reduce time-travel, develop automation in Air Traffic Control (ATC) and make better use of small aircraft and underused airports. The Smart Landing Facility (SLF) is an important part of the program. The SLF is a small airport upgraded with equipment to support SATS aircraft. Among the SLF equipment, SATS needs new detection equipment, and eventually automation. This thesis investigates different techniques to avoid data collision in aircraft radar responses, and to reduce delays between landings and take offs. First, the paper shows how and when the radar receiver can separate two overlapped radar responses. Second, to avoid transponders responses overlapping, requirements in terms of aircraft safety distance are computed, different conflicts in air traffic around the SLF are examined and a solution is proposed for each case. And finally, the thesis investigates how far SATS can go in developing an automatic ATC system and what the role of future human operator will be in ATC. / Master of Science