Inspiration
When getting on a plane, sometimes we have to wait without landing. If an airplane fails to land on time, passengers become anxious about the delay time, and it is difficult for pilots and stewards to continue working, and the fuel used for flight increases, resulting in higher carbon emissions. The idea that came to mind while thinking about all these problems is AirControl.
Automating air traffic control by assigning runways can help the aviation industry's challenges. By reducing congestion and providing broad airspace, pilots are less stressed as they know which runways to land on. It improves safety standards as it reduces the risk of human error. Because it's safer and faster, it brings up a seamless travel experience for passengers. More than that, it leads to reduced delays, less fuel consumption, lower carbon emissions, and contributes to the environmental sustainability aviation industry.
AirControl was made to strive for safer, more efficient, and sustainable air travel for the airline.
What it does.
Our website assigns which runway the flights will land on. We have access to the American Airlines flight information and available time dataset of runways from Goerge Bush International Houston Airport. Depending on the period of the flight arrival time and the availability of the runway, the website shows which runway the flight should use before they get directions from the control tower. It gives them a chance to double-check the order and get ready in advance. Also, the website has a Power Virtual AI Agent to help the users with issues or questions and a survey tap to adopt user-friendly opinions.
How we built it
We used React for the frontend, node.js/Javascript/MongoDB for the backend, and BotPress for the AI chatbot.
Challenges we ran into
We could not find the database for IAH runway information including their available time for each runway, schedule, and location. So, we needed to create a database of our own. Also, we were out of time to add weather forecasting features as a factor to decide the best runway to recommend. We needed to give up on that.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
1) By creating an environment in which everyone could concentrate, everyone could concentrate on their roles. Everyone supported each other as we had decided on the same goal, to finish the project with our ideas. Sharing knowledge was the key point of our team's success. 2) Microsoft's free trial for student accounts ended so we had to find a similar website to create a chatbot or code everything from the beginning. We found other good websites that are easy to use and learned how it actually write code for our order.
What we learned
We learned how to use MongoDB for our databases. While organizing and working on the frontend, we were able to have time to think from different perspectives in order to consider the user's experience. While we were sharing our thoughts, we gained the ability to accept and express opinions confidently for great communication. Lastly, we learned that, when a website stops working on Safari, don't waste your time. Just try again on Chrome and it will work for most of the time.
What's next for AirControl
Our goal is to provide the best runway in advance so pilots know where to go and there is no air traffic. But, we can't forget about safety. We will try to add weather foresting data as one of the factors to decide which runway works the best for the pilots as unpredictable weather conditions is one of the aviation industry challenges. After that, we can develop our UI/UX better. Once we are settled, we will start collecting more data from different airports and airlines.
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