TF-2004-14 DFRC

Wake Vortex Research

NASA conducted a series of research flights beginning in late 1969 and continuing into the 1970s
that studied the dynamics, characteristics, and hazards of wingtip vortices. Data accumulated by the vortex
studies contributed to a broader understanding of these dangerous wakes of turbulent air that trail behind
every aircraft, and helped the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) establish safe separation distances
between various sizes of aircraft during takeoff and landing operations, and also during cruise flight.

Vortices produced by small aircraft are almost negligible, but vortices created by larger and heavier
aircraft can be extremely dangerous for a distance of many miles to a trailing aircraft. Wake vortex and
turbulence generated by large aircraft can cause instability, uncontrollable rolls, and sudden loss of altitude.
There have been incidents, especially at lower altitudes during landing approaches, when wake turbulence
has resulted in fatal accidents because of insufficient time and altitude for pilots to regain full control of
their aircraft after being buffeted violently by the powerful vortices.

The first series of NASA wake

turbulence research flights were conducted
by the NASA Dryden Flight Research
Center in 1969-70, when large wide-
bodied jet transports were being
introduced into commercial and military
service and a mix of large, medium, and
small aircraft was being seen at nearly
every major airport. These first tests
measured the strength of vortices created
by large “jumbo” aircraft and measured
their effects on smaller trailing aircraft.
Between the years 1972 and 1974, three
additional series of wake turbulence tests
were flown at NASA Dryden with
Smoke streams from on-board generators of a 747 jumbo jet to present a
emphasis on the use of wing flaps, speed visual picture of the magnitude of wake vortices created by large aircraft.
brakes, and spoilers to alter the formation, This 747 is the same one acquired by NASA and later modified to carry
strength, and behavior of vortices space shuttles.
generated by large aircraft.
NASA Photo ECN-4242

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 Data from the research flights aided the FAA Studies have shown that an aircraft’s weight,
in establishing the current separation distances that speed, and shape governs the strength of the vortices
require that during landings a small aircraft must and weight is the dominant factor. Small general
remain six miles behind a large wide-bodied aircraft, aviation aircraft like those in the Cessna and Piper
and two large wide-body jets cannot be closer than general aviation fleets create vortices that are almost
four miles. During takeoffs, three-minute intervals undetectable by a trailing aircraft of similar size.
are required between small and large aircraft. Large jetliners, however, leave vortices that can
Separation distances of up to five miles are also exceed 150 mph in rotational velocity and are still
applied between various sizes of aircraft while detectable at distances of 20 miles. The strongest -
cruising at or near the same altitude. - and most dangerous vortices -- are generated by
aircraft that are heavy, are in a clean gear and flaps-
Conducting and coordinating the vortex up condition, and are flying at slow speeds like those
research flights was the NASA Dryden Flight of landing approaches.
Research Center. Also taking part in one or more
phases of the program were the Federal Aviation Wake vortices can cause violent rolling
Administration, the Air Force Flight Test Center at motions and even flip a small aircraft upside down
Edwards AFB, the NASA Ames Research Center, when a pilot trailing a large aircraft flies into the
the NASA Langley Research Center, McDonnell vortices. The power of these dangerous spinning
Douglas, and Lockheed. vortices can cause an aircraft to become
uncontrollable. In these instances, crewmembers and
passengers have sustained injuries during the periods
What is Wake Vortex? of buffeting, instability and altitude loss. In most all
cases, control of the aircraft is restored if there is
Every aircraft generates a wake of turbulent sufficient altitude. Some aircraft have sustained
air when it flies. This disturbance is caused by a serious structural damage when encountering wake
pair of tornado-like counter-rotating vortices that vortices but were landed safely. There are, however,
trail from the tips of the wings. The existence of cases in which smaller trailing aircraft, during a
these cylindrical vortices was proclaimed in 1907, climb-out after takeoff or during a landing approach,
just four years after the first powered aircraft flights have crashed after entering wake vortices because
by the Wright Brothers, following airflow studies they were too close to the ground for the pilots to
by British aerodynamicist F. W. Lanchester. recover full control.

Aerodynamic lift, which causes an aircraft to In the early days of flight, this disturbance of
rise into the air, is generated by the difference in air air was called “prop wash.” Although the vortices
pressure as it moves across the upper and lower wing were recognized as turbulence, they were not
surfaces. As a wing moves through the air, low completely understood by most people in the
pressure is created across the curved upper wing aviation community. Wake vortex also did not
surface and high pressure exists under the wing present a serious problem to trailing aircraft until
where the surface is fairly flat. This pressure large, heavy aircraft like the 747s, DC-10s, L-1011s,
differential creates lift, but it also causes the airflow and C-5s began flying in the late 1960s and early
behind the wing to roll into a swirling mass and form 70s.
into two counter-rotating circular vortices
downstream of the wing tips.

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 The flying community had been aware of wake In calm wind conditions, vortices created by
turbulence generated by smaller aircraft for years large aircraft during landing operations can remain
and accepted it as a factor of flying when the first for many minutes over the normal touchdown area.
707-size jet transports began operating in 1959. They can also slowly drift from one runway to a
Larger and stronger vortices created by the new jets nearby parallel or crossing runway.
then, however, did raise concerns about traffic
spacing and a separation distance of three miles was
established during landings when pilots were flying The Research Flights
on instrument flight rules (IFR). When flying under
visual flight rules (VFR), pilots assumed the The first series of wake turbulence research
responsibility of maintaining their own separation flights by NASA Dryden began in late 1969 and
distances, and their general knowledge of wake continued into 1970. Three additional series of
vortex at that time usually resulted in safe operational flights were conducted between 1972-74 with
procedures. emphasis on the use of wing flaps, speed brakes,
and spoilers to alter the formation, strength, and
It was the introduction in 1970 of the larger behavior of vortices.
wide-bodied “jumbo” jets with much stronger
vortices that led to an effort by the FAA, NASA, the The research flights used large aircraft to
Air Force, and the commercial aviation community generate the vortices and smaller ones to probe them.
to study the growing wake vortex phenomena and Each probe aircraft was instrumented to record a
establish safe operational distances between similar variety of parameters, including longitudinal and
and dissimilar size aircraft. transverse acceleration, velocity in pitch, roll, and
yaw conditions, bank angles, control wheel position,
and in some cases angles of attack and sideslip.
The Behavior of Vortices Ground-based radar was used to measure and
maintain exact lateral and vertical separation
Since wake vortices are a by-product of between the probe and wake-generating aircraft.
aerodynamic lift, they are generated as soon as an
aircraft begins to leave the ground. When viewed A 100-mile long racetrack course over the
from in front of an aircraft, or from behind, the Mojave Desert was used for the first two series of
circulation of vortices is outward, upward, and flights. The other two series of flights were
around the wing tip. conducted within restricted airspace over and near
Edwards AFB, and within the Pacific missile test
NASA research has shown that as large aircraft range west of Vandenberg AFB, Calif.
move through the air, trailing vortices tend to remain
spaced less than a wingspan apart while sinking at a In the first test series, a C-5A military transport
rate of several hundred feet per minute. Over time, and a B-52 bomber were flown to generate the
the sink rate will slow and their strength will taper vortices, while the probe aircraft were a CV-990
off. Research has shown, however, that vortices can four-engine jetliner and an F-104 Starfighter. At a
also rise during conditions of ambient thermal lifting. test altitude of 12,500 feet, the CV-990 and the F-
104 probed the vortex wakes of both large aircraft
Vortices of large aircraft often move laterally at separation distances that ranged from 1 to 15
at speeds of 2-3 knots when they sink to within 100- miles. The wake-generating aircraft were flown in
200 feet of the ground.

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both the clean configuration and with flaps lowered wake and an L-1011 and a DC-9 probing the DC-
to represent landing configurations. 10-40 wake.

Also flown, as vortex generators in the first The flights revealed that the strength of the
series of flights, were the CV-990, C-5A, and a DC- vortices produced by the largest and heaviest of the
9 commercial transport. The DC-9 and the CV-990 tri-jets, the DC-10-40, was comparable to vortices
were also used to probe vortices of the larger aircraft, generated by the C-5A.
along with a Learjet 23 business-type aircraft and a
twin-engine Cessna 210 general aviation aircraft. The third round of flights was in 1973, when a
The test altitude for all the probes of the second series 727-200 three-engine jetliner was the wake
was 12,500 feet, except for the Cessna flights, which generating aircraft and a PA-30, a Learjet, and an F-
dropped to 9,500 feet. Airspeeds for this series of 104 was the probing aircraft. The effort of this round
tests ranged from 130 to 200 knots and separation of tests was to study changes occurring in vortex
distances again ranged from 1 to 15 miles. The characteristics during the steeper descent path used
wake-generating aircraft were flown in both clean in a two-stage noise abatement landing approach.
and landing flap configurations. The Learjet and Smoke generators were attached to the wing tips of
the Cessna 210, however, were not flown into the the 727-200 to help chart differences between vortex
wake of the C-5A while it was in the clean flows created during normal landing approaches and
configuration because of flight safety. the noise abatement approaches.

On several of the flights, the CV-990 and the The fourth and final main series of flights,
C-5A were paired up and flown in formation on a carried out in 1974, used a 747 jumbo jet as the
parallel course while probe aircraft flew into the generator aircraft and a T-37B and a Learjet probed
wake vortices alternately to gather comparative data. the wakes. The 747 was the same one acquired by
The CV-990 was then teamed with the C-5A and NASA that was later modified to carry the space
the same scenario was repeated. shuttles. The main effort was the investigation of
the 747’s wake vortex strength while flying with
Most of the vortex probes lasted from two to different inboard and outboard flap settings. Earlier
three minutes while the probe aircraft at various NASA wind and water tunnel studies indicated that
speeds, weights, and configurations was the strength could be reduced if the plane was flown
accumulating data. When an upset or extreme roll with greater inboard and less outboard flap
rate was generated by the wake, the probe pilots deflections.
returned the aircraft to the wake path as soon as
possible. The tests, conducted over a span of 17 flights,
showed that vortex strength was softened with the
During the second series of tests, conducted 30/1 setting -- outboard flaps at 1degree while
in November 1972, the focus was on wide-bodied maintaining a 30-degree deflection on the inboard
tri-jets such as the DC-10 and L-1011 series of flaps.
transports.
Combinations of inboard-outboard flap
The wake-generating aircraft in the second settings tested were 30/30, 30/20, 30/10, 30/5, 30/1,
series of tests were a C-5A and a DC-10-40, with a and 5/30.
DC-10-10 and a Learjet used to probe the C-5A’s

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 A Learjet and an Air Force T-
37 meet in the skies over NASA
Dryden for a series of flights
to study the hazards of wake
vortex generated by large
aircraft. Studies conducted
from the late 1960s to 1974
used large aircraft as wake
generators and smaller
instrumented aircraft such as
the Learjet and T-37 were
flown into the vortices to
determine vortex strength and
safe separation distances. The
747 is the same one acquired
by NASA and later modified to
carry space shuttles.
NASA Photo ECN-4243

Pilots flying probe aircraft concluded that the inboard thrust.

30/1 inboard-outboard setting provided the best
vortex alleviation and the safe-separation distance In each of the series of test flights, probe pilots
at that setting dropped from 7.5 miles to 3 miles flying near and into vortices experienced varying
with the landing gear retracted. With landing gear degrees of instability, altitude loss, and rolling
down, however, the separation distance had to be excursions due to strong turbulence. Fortunately,
increased to six miles, a factor that made the none of the aircraft involved in any of the tests was
configuration impractical. structurally damaged. Experiences logged by probe
pilots included sudden altitude losses of up to 4000
The study also investigated the use of speed feet, sudden rolls of up to 720 degrees at rates of
brakes and spoilers to alter the behavior of vortices. more than 200 degrees second, and violent yaw
Spoilers did reduce the strength of vortices, but the accelerations.
difference was not significant enough to prove
suitable. In 1979, a brief series of flights with an L-
1011 was conducted to determine if the use of
Tests with the 747 included a look at engine spoilers, which had slightly reduced vortex strength
thrust rates as a means of reducing vortex strength, on the 747, could be applied on other wide-body
including alternating symmetrical maximum and idle aircraft. Flight results, however, showed that
thrust in the inboard and outboard engine pairs. No although spoilers contributed to some reduction on
concrete conclusions resulted but pilots believe that the L-1011, they were not as effective as with the
outboard thrust lessened vortex strength more than 747.

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The Benefits of Vortex Research Into The Future

Data produced by the series of vortex research NASA researchers still continue to learn more
flights aided the FAA in determining safe, minimum about wake vortex and strive to predict and reduce
separations distances between aircraft to minimize the hazards associated with wake turbulence.
potential hazards that can occur when large and small
aircraft are mixed during normal airport operations. The latest system to be studied is the use of
calibrated microphone arrays and laser radars on and
The research data accumulated in the vortex near airports to locate and record wake vortices. The
studies also represents a wealth of information that thrust of the study is to find out if an acoustic-based
continues to contribute to a broader industry wake vortex sensor is feasible for an airport
understanding of the turbulent air that trails behind environment. An operational system of this type
every aircraft. may be able to give pilots advance warnings of the
location and strength of wake turbulence.