Helping airlines reduce controllable flight delays by identifying at-risk departures using real-time data
Aircraft Turnaround Management is an enterprise-grade platform that sources real-time aviation data to support *Station Operation Managers (SOMs) to easily identify delay risks and coordinate smoother "turns" — preparing an arriving aircraft for its next departure.
*SOMs distribute resources to address flight delays, customer service responsibilities, and safety issues as they arise.
My Role: UX Designer (Main designer for the "Flight Details" View)
Team: Esther Lin, Jordan Kussmann, Leanne Liu, Cara Pangelinan
Duration: March - June 2020
Type: Senior Capstone Project (Sponsored by APiJET)
PROBLEM SPACE
“An airplane doesn't make money sitting on the ground.”
According to CAPA, on average, flight delays cost an airline:
$76
/minute
$28.9 B
/year
Lack of real-time information between aircraft systems, ground operations and turnaround teams is the main problem of causing flight delays, therefore, careful management of aircraft operations during the *turnaround period is key to reducing these expensive delays.
*Turnaround period: The time interval between an aircraft arriving and departing. Turnaround activities include cleaning, loading catering, refilling fuel, and checking the exterior of the aircraft.
Research Question
How might we improve the usability of APiJET’s Turnaround Management so that Station Operation Managers (SOMs) canidentify delay risks, maximize the efficiency of individual aircraft turns, and ultimately reduce flight delays?
1. Shows all the flights that SOMs are in charge of (past, current, and future scheduled). 2. Uses a Gantt Chart and List View to show flight information, flight statuses, notifications, and delay codes. 3. Allows for customized information of each flight by adding tags and notes.
"Flight Details" view: Detailed flight information and turnaround activities for a specific flight
1. Shows the progress of each turnaround activity.
2. Alerts the SOM that a turnaround activity is falling behind. 3. Shows detailed information about passenger boarding, critical and preventative delays, door statuses, and aircraft consumables.
"Reports" view: Insightful visualizations regarding past flights' delay information and performance data
1. Provides relevant visualizations to show the common delay causes, average delay time, on schedule %, and all flight delay records.
2. Allows for comparison of delay information between two different date intervals.
RESEARCH INSIGHTS
Station Operation Manager x 1
Pilot x 2
Inflight Leader x 2
APiJET Project Manager x 4
We interviewed 9 stakeholders total, and here is what we found:
SOM is the Heartbeat of the Airport
“I receive a ton of information and then I distribute it… [I’m] the heartbeat of the airport: things come in, they get deciphered, they get understood, and then they get distributed.” (SOM)
Lack of Data Management
"These airlines have a ton of data, they just don't have a good way to view it... They need to be in a presentable format that they can take actionable action on." (Pilots)
Cannot be Proactive to Reduce Controllable Delays
“Show me what's happening before it becomes a problem so that I can take action on it." (SOM)
Scattered Information
Information is scattered in many places. Station Operation Managers use email, Airline Interphone System, Aircraft Interphone System, eight monitors, radio, and in-person talking to receive and deliver information.
Lack of Visual Indications of the Turnaround Activities' Statuses
"...being able to look at the application and say, You know what, they're just finishing loading bags, looks like the last passenger just checked-in. We [pilots] can start running checklists..." (Pilots)
High-stakes & High-stress Process
The entire turnaround process can be as short as 30 minutes and is oftena high-stress, high-stakes processfor airlines to pay for any time loss or delays.
User persona
Station Operation Managers are our primary users
Station Operation Managers distribute resources to address delays, customer service responsibilities, and safety issues as they arise. Their goals are to ensure passenger safety and reduce flight delays.
COMMUNICATION MAP
To improve our confidence in available data and credibility of sources
This map helped us figure out where and how we can get the data displaying on the application.
Priority 1: View and customize information based on what is relevant to the users.
Visualize the progress of different turnaround activities (e.g. catering, passenger loading, etc) and their completion statuses.
View Projected Time of Departure (PTD), Scheduled Time of Departure (STD), and Estimated Time of Departure (ETD).
Gain information confidence through clear indication of invalid or stale data by receiving accurate, timely information.
Priority 2: View and download weekly or monthly reports for future improvements in the turnaround process
Priority 3: View actionable steps based on the provided information and recommended priorities (e.g. “Catering is due in 10 minutes, consider contacting XYZ.”)
Information architecture
Visualize the interaction flow and key features
We decided to focus on priority 1, viewing information, for our MVP. The application includes, Flights view, Flight Details view, and Reports.
Ideation & iterations
Iterations - Flight Details View
We presented mid-fidelity wireframes to APiJET to get feedback on our proposal of three main views for the Aircraft Turnaround Management Application.
Wireframes Feedback: • Improved the timeline design since it was the most eye-catching feature and contained important information. • Emphasized when activities are supposed to be done to better visualize how well a team is completing a turn.
Mid-fidelity Feedback: • Recommended to clarify the list items on the left (i.e. which flights are currently being turned and which flights are in the air).
After analyzing the results of our usability testing session, we made 3 main improvements. Improvement 1: Clarify Actual vs Scheduled Times We reversed the color assignment for the actual and scheduled times and reduced the number of colors so that SOM can put more emphasis on the actual times than scheduled times.
Improvement 2: Improve the Discoverability of the Delay Feed We added colored indicators and relocated the feature to the nav bar to improve the discoverability of the delay feed.
Improvement 3: Improve the Visual Hierarchy of the "Reports" View We created two sets of monochromatic colors for the date comparison feature and improved the visual hierarchy to allow SOM to comprehend the information more easily.
Challenge: Break Into an Entirely New and Complex Industry The aviation industry is a very complex industry that doesn't change much. It was a challenge for us to understand the complexity of the problem space and balance how people used to do things and be innovative. Iterative Design After the capstone has ended, I went back to our research and spent 3 more weeks to redesign the whole application. Prioritize Features We received so many great feature ideas from the stakeholders and our sponsor. However, it's very important as a designer to prioritize the features based on design requirements and project goals. Therefore, we prioritized "Viewing Information" in our design, and left "Receiving and Sending Alerts" and "Suggesting Actions Based on Alerts" for future design recommendations. Fun Fact Passenger always board from the left side of the plane because the right side is used for fueling and catering.
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