Research and Design of an Airfield Runway FOD Detection System Based on WSN

Foreign object debris (FOD) would potentially cause huge damage when it appears on the airport runway, so the FOD surveillance system is one of the essential protectors for airplane’s safety now. This paper introduces a designed method of airport runway FOD detection system based on WSN, analyzes function of various image acquisition sensors, and introduces FOD image analysis algorithm. Finally WSN data fusion technology is used to analyze the FOD image. 1. Foreword What is FOD? FOD is the abbreviation of foreign object debris, which refers to a foreign substance that may damage the aircraft system. There are many types of FOD, such as connecting pieces between aircraft and engine, flying objects, wild animal, leaves, sand, and stone. FOD is very harmful to the aircraft. For example, Air France Concorde crash in July 25, 2000 caused by FOD killed 113 people. The crash created by FOD took research of FOD automatic, fast, and accurate monitoring and alarm system on the agenda. This further proved that an effective safety airport runway intelligent detection system is an important part of the airport flight safety system. Nowadays, there are four typical systems in the world, the British Tarsier system (Figure 1(a)), FOD Detect detection system of Israel (Figure 1(b)), FOD Finder monitoring system (Figure 1(c)), and iFerret monitoring system (Figure 1(d)) [1–4]. Figure 1: (a) Tarsier system. (b) FOD Detect detection system. (c) FOD Finder monitoring system. (d) iFerret monitoring system. At present, most of the domestic airports are still using manual method which is neither efficient nor safe. China has not yet found the radar system on FOD monitoring. Current research methods for detecting runway FOD are mainly for image processing on the runway image to realize the detection and localization of FOD. This paper introduces the design of a runway detection system based on WSN. The main purpose of this design is to conduct real-time detection, recognition, and tracking of track target, for the general sensors are unable to achieve this goal. In this design, the radar sensor, visible light cameras, infrared cameras, and laser ranging technology are used to further analyze the grade of target threat and the position of the FOD. In addition, the system uses multiple sensors to detect, so we use the sensor data fusion technology. This design is both innovative and practical. 2. Construction of System Model 2.1. The Basic Function of the System According to the needs of real-time detection of airport runway FOD, FOD detection system should have the following