Measuring Flight Efficiency: Melissa Hofmann Joins ISA for a Data-Driven Study

Melissa’s internship focuses on analyzing real flight data to assess horizontal efficiency and identify sources of air traffic inefficiency—contributing to more sustainable aviation.

Melissa Isabell Hofmann is currently immersed in a 6-month end-of-studies internship at the Institute for Sustainable Aviation (ISA) in Toulouse! As a Master’s student in Aerospace Engineering within the double degree program of TUM (Munich) and ISAE-SUPAERO (Toulouse), she is contributing to a significant project on efficiencies in collaboration with Thales AVS and Thales LAS.

Her work, under the supervision of Laurent Joly, Scott Delbecq (ISAE-SUPAERO), and Xavier Olive (ONERA), focuses on the « Horizontal Flight Efficiency Evaluation. » This involves retrieving and recasting flight plans and trajectories for ten carefully selected city pairs (including at least one European Airport). By comparing these with reference trajectories, she will implement robust efficiency metrics for large-scale evaluation. This rigorous approach will enable the identification, quantification, and attribution of both structural and contingent inefficiencies. Excited to have her contribute to advancements in sustainable aviation!