A Review on Weather Impact on Aviation Operations: Visibility, Wind, Precipitation, Icing

Meteorological conditions affect aviation, marine, and land transportation, and play an important role in aviation accidents and operations. Wind (Uh), visibility (Vis), and Precipitation rate and amount (PR and PA) are the most important meteorological parameters that affect the terminal weather and in- flight conditions. Weather is considered a causal factor in about 30% of all US aviation accidents (NASA, 1999). Fatal aviation accidents based on the NTSB data related to ceiling, fog, and wind are estimated at 20%, 14%, and 10%, correspondingly. Knowing weather conditions can help to improve operational planning, including fuel consumption and people safety. Wind shear and gust, and turbulence need to be measured or predicted for the flight route and airport terminal weather. In addition, low Vis and ceiling are the second most important weather events affecting aviation operations. Lastly, precipitation type, rate and amount are the third important group of parameters that severely affect the flight operations such as de-icing. Earlier analysis of these events suggested that the meteorological conditions need to be studied in detail to better predict and monitor weather conditions for operational needs. In this respect, both observations quality and numerical weather predictions model simulations should be improved, and both new technologies and statistical models such as machine learning and artificial intelligence analysis should be developed for the aviation operations.