Robustness Analysis of the Regional and Interregional Components of the Weighted World Air Transportation Network

Informations

Résumé

Te robustness of a system indicates its ability to withstand disturbances while maintaining its properties, performance, and efciency. Tere are plenty of studies on the robustness of air transport networks in the literature. However, few works consider its mesoscopic organization. Building on the recently introduced component structure, we explore the impact of targeted attacks on the weighted world air transportation network on its components. Indeed, it contains fve local components covering diferent regions (North America•Caribbean, Europe•Russia, East and Southeast Asia•Oceania, Africa•Middle East•Southern Asia, and South America) and one global component linking these regions. We investigate targeted attacks based on infuential weighted centrality measures (strength, betweenness, and PageRank). Results show that the local components gradually separate from the world air transportation network as the fraction of removed airports grows. Te weighted betweenness attack removes fewer top airports to isolate the regions compared to its alternatives. Furthermore, it is still convenient to travel locally in the separate areas. In contrast, strength and PageRank attacks need to target more airports to split the network. However, they are more disruptive. Indeed, the size of the isolated local components reduces drastically, so it becomes more challenging to travel locally. Looking at the world air transportation network through its component structure reveals a new viewpoint on its resilence. It opens new perspectives to design more efcient attacks.