A thorough review of aircraft landing operation from practical and theoretical standpoints at an airport which may include a single or multiple runways

The organization of landing operation and related issues within an Air Traffic Control (ATC) system in the airport Terminal Maneuvering Area (TMA) are hitherto performed by human air traffic controllers. These latter skilled buffers are responsible for aligning and controlling a continuous inbound flow of aircraft. These tasks are beginning from the time of notification of the getting of arrivals to the TMA entry fixes until the end of landings on the assigned runway(s). The whole duties carried out by air traffic controllers, such as arrival control, sequencing, scheduling, and assignment solutions are frequently implemented according to the information shown on various instruments, and some simple rules such as First Come First Served (FCFS) discipline. It is also worth noting that the training and past experience of the air traffic controllers are playing a leading role, and are essential part of decision-making processes. Since the demand for air traffic has continued to rise and with the emergence of congested airports, it became clear that the mission entrusted to the air traffic controller and its ability to undertake in its job in the right way has become increasingly more exacting. Consequently, there has been a greater demand to make the ATC more automated by improving aircraft scheduling/sequencing techniques, and developing further decision support systems, to which the challenge intends to alleviate the human intervention and not to replace the air traffic controller. Here of, the core goal is to provide a system review of past and the most up-to-date research related to the Aircraft Landing Problem (ALP) for an airport, which may include a single or multiple runways. Recognizing that the theoretical aspect relating to the ALP is dealt with this study, the evaluation of several solutions for that specific problem is furthermore covered. This evaluation will not succeed without explaining first the landing operation from a practical standpoint, which is a fundamental way to better understand the reasons why research effort has been devoted to suggest solutions for the overall arrival management. A comparative study which selects the distinguishing features that can be recognized in some research works against other related works is then proposed. In the last, a summary of the findings of published literature and recommendations for the future trend of ALP are pointed up as conclusions. •We present an overview about the aircraft landing problem.