Doppler LIDAR Developments for Aeronautics

Overview & Synopsis

Detecting atmospheric hazards such as wake vortices, turbulences, wind shear or wind gusts would improve flight and airport traffic safety. Moreover, to face the current and future challenges of air traffic growth in terms of environment, safety and costs, one of the major challenges is to increase runway throughput by optimizing the distance separation between aircraft. These are some of the issues, among others, addressed by Doppler LIDARs. This powerful technique can provide remote air speed data and is being deployed on the ground or in flight. The paper presents some of the recent Doppler LIDAR developments at ONERA. Some insight into state-of-the-art technology is provided, as well as perspectives for future applications in aeronautics.