Air traffic control centers are responsible for recording positions, clearances, and predicting trajectories. However, it is the responsibility of air traffic controllers to monitor air traffic and ensure aircraft safety. In order to do this, air traffic controllers must resolve any conflicts that are predicted. A conflict is when two aircrafts come within five nautical miles in the horizontal plan or 1000 feet in the vertical plan. The controllers are required to maneuver as many aircrafts as necessary to clear any conflicts that are predicted to occur. However, controllers are not required to record their actions and thus they seldom do. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is tasked with recording and analyzing conflict resolutions in the national airspace system.

This research describes a novel method for automatically cataloging aircraft conflict resolutions, given the data recorded during a predicted conflict. The algorithm categorizes the actions of air traffic controllers during predicted conflicts into three resolutions: horizontal maneuver (left or right turn), vertical maneuver (descending or ascending), and speed change (accelerating or decelerating). The algorithm catalogues the frequency of each resolution, allowing for further analysis of the results by the FAA. The analysis, development, and evaluation of this method will be presented.