[abaillargeon]

I get excited seeing stories about aviation on HN because it's something I work on every day. I've written a few comments above but I'm developer on the system you described (and more) being used in aircraft today.

With a GPS and onboard databases of runways and taxiways, we can determine if a pilot is attempting to take off or land on a taxiway. The key is preventing nuisance alerts when the pilot is just flying around and happens to be aligned with a runway. The "11 secret herbs and spices" depend on the aircraft but are usually speed and configuration (ie landing gear) based. Approaches are fairly predictable and we can use that to sequence through a state machine that tells us the pilot intends to land.

Here's a video of the system on a G1000 (meant for smaller planes) skip to 0:45ish https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2bswm0w4cY

[Waterluvian]

Thank you for sharing. Really cool to see just how much real-time GIS there is in aviation these days.