Recovery of Sideslip Angle and True Airspeed from ADS-B Trajectory Data Using Weather Integration

Abstract

Airspeed is a critical parameter for ensuring the safety of air transportation, as aircraft stability and guidance directly depend on its accurate value due to its influence on lift generation. Together with angle of attack and sideslip angle, airspeed defines the aircraft's relationship with the surrounding airflow, while deviations of these parameters beyond permissible limits may lead to hazardous flight conditions. Modern Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) technology provides extensive capabilities for air traffic management by enabling aircraft to broadcast key flight parameters. However, airflow-related parameters, such as true airspeed and sideslip angle, are not included in the standard ADS-B message set and are therefore typically unavailable to monitoring systems. In this paper, we propose an approach for recovering true airspeed and sideslip angle based on ADS-B trajectory data. The method utilizes sequences of aircraft positions, including latitude, longitude, and pressure altitude, to estimate ground speed. By integrating ground speed with historical weather data, the proposed algorithm reconstructs true airspeed and sideslip angle. The developed approach enables real-time estimation of critical airflow parameters, which can be used for safety monitoring through comparison with predefined operational limits. Experimental validation is performed using air traffic data collected via a network of software-defined radios.