ANIMA D3.2 - Development of indicators for night noise protection zones

The present deliverable pursues the principle of minimizing acute effects (additional aircraft noise induced awakening reactions) so that long-term consequences (increased health risks) do not occur. For this aim, the analysis of the data from the currently only two worldwide available field studies on the impact of aircraft noise on sleep, that used the “gold standard” polysomnography for sleep and simultaneous acoustical measurements, have been improved and a pooled analysis was operated. The data were measured at one airport with continuous nocturnal aircraft noise (Cologne/Bonn) and at the other airport with a night flight ban between 11 pm and 5 am but very busy traffic in the shoulder hours (Frankfurt airport).

The results show that the probability to awake from an aircraft overflight (aircraft noise event) with the same maximum level in both cases just differs within the reasonable confidence intervals so that the results of the exposure-response function of the pooled data promise a fairly good transferability to other airports.