Delays, cancellations, endless waiting - such situations are often described in the media as being chaotic. But are they really chaos? This question was first examined within the scope of a doctoral thesis in the virtual institute, a cooperation between DLR and RWTH Aachen.
In this thesis, delay data of airports were analyzed with regard to their degree of chaos by means of (among others) multidimensional regression, fuzzy clustering method, and spectral analysis. Parameters were identified that had an impact on the delays. These analyses allowed the development of a model for the prediction of off-block delays on the basis of airport status parameters.
Chaos at the Airport? (Download PDF [german])