ABSTRACT
Flight planning is the process of identifying a flying plan for each flight prior to its departure and involves two major functions. The first is to calculate the amount of fuel needed by an aircraft before flying from an origin airport to a destination airport. The second is related to determining a flight path that complies with air traffic control (ATC) requirements. The task facing a flight planning system becomes more complicated when there is more than one possible route between the origin and destination airports because the degree of calculation required to produce an accurate flight plan is so complicated that it is not feasible to thoroughly examine every possible route. The early efforts on modeling the airline's tankering problem are due to Darnell and Loflin who develop the fuel management and allocation model that determines the optimal strategy for fueling aircraft and can be used to support both short- and long-term planning.
