In 1985 Mike Irrgang led the development of the first airport gate assignment system, which was implemented at United Airlines at ORD and DEN.
It was written up in Aviation Week. This system was considered an “AI system”. AI in the 1980’s was different from today’s AI. “AI” referred to the use and combination of what were known as “AI technologies”: rule-based expert systems implemented using symbolic processing, i.e. with underlying object-oriented frame-based systems with inheritance and dynamic objects which could change their locations in the frame inheritance hierarchy. The systems were developed using knowledge engineering via rapid prototyping software development.
The United gate management system led to the development of the very first airline irregular operations system in 1987. This system would track all flights, and show the downline effects of all flight delays, cancellations, diversions, and illegal crews.
Once there was a disruption, the system enabled the creation of various repair scenarios. Repair scenarios showed the future “cost” impacts of the repair in terms of delay minutes, illegal crews, aircraft in the wrong location, and cancellations. The user could then choose the scenario which minimized the desired impacts, and implement the operational changes with the push of a button
In 1989, this system went into production at Iberia Airlines and Thai Airways. The systems and technology were written up in Air Transport World
The approach used by Mike Irrgang’s team is further documented here:
