System Operations Advisor: A Real-Time Decision Support System for Managing Airline Operations at United Airlines

Managing daily operations for United Airlines with its size and geographic scope of operations is complex and challenging. Because resources are tightly coupled, even minor perturbations could erode planned operations. United Airlines deploys the System Operations Advisor (SOA), a real-time decision support system at its operations control center (OCC) to increase the effectiveness of its operational decisions. We developed the SOA and implemented it in August 1992. It has been in operation since then. From October 1993 to March 1994, its application saved more than 27,000 minutes of potential delays, which translates to $540,000 savings in delay costs, and the number of flight delays charged to aircraft controllers in systems operations control has dropped by 50 percent since 1992.