Loss of control testing of light aircraft and a cost effective approach to flight test

Copyright @ The Society of Flight Test EngineersLoss of control in Visual Meteorological Conditions (VMC) is the most common cause of fatal accidents involving light aircraft in the UK and probably worldwide. Understanding why LoC events occur and why there are apparent differences between aircraft types is currently under investigation by Brunel Flight Safety Laboratory (BFSL). Using a case study approach for selected light aircraft used in the training environment and based upon a 29 year study of UK fatal accidents, BFSL undertook a qualitative and quantitative review of fatal stall/spin accidents using a combination of statistical and qualitative analysis. Aircraft/model design differences and published material were reviewed with respect to performance and handling qualities for possible clues, and informal interviews were conducted with type-experienced students, pilots and flying instructors. A flight test programme was executed using multiple examples (for fleet-wide attributes) of aircraft models to enable assessment and comparison of flying qualities (both qualitatively and quantitatively). Working within the continuous budget constraints of academia, a creative and cost effective flight test programme was developed without compromising safety. The two-man team (TP & FTE) used standard (unmodified) flying club and syndicate aircraft in conjunction with non-invasive low cost flight test instrumentation. Tests included apparent longitudinal (static and dynamic) stability and control characteristics, stall and low-speed handling characteristics and cockpit ergonomics / pilot workload. During this programme, adaptations were also made to the classic Cooper-Harper “point tracking” method towards a “boundary avoidance” method. The paper describes tools and techniques used, research findings, the team's lessons learned and proposed future research. It also discusses the possible application of research results in aircraft, pilot and environmental causal factors, enabling a better understanding of LoC incidents and future avoidance within the light aircraft community.Financial support from the Thomas Gerald Gray Charitable Trust Research Scholarship Scheme was used in this study

Flight test: Supporting the investigation of factors affecting loss of control of light aircraft

A quarter of all fatal General Aviation accidents in the UK during the period 1980 to 2006 involved Loss of Control (LoC) in Visual Meteorological Conditions (VMC). LoC has consistently appeared in accident statistics over this period, but at apparently different rates for different aircraft types. This raises two important questions - why do these LoC events happen and why is there a difference between aircraft types?. One case in point is that of the Cessna 150 /152 and over the 27-year period analysed, the Cessna 150 falls approximately on the average for fatal accidents in the UK GA fleet, whereas the Cessna 152 exhibits a lower accident rate. Brunel Flight Safety Laboratory, in conjunction with the UK General Aviation Safety Council, undertook to try and understand why this is so. The key design differences in relation to performance and handling qualities were researched using available published material and informal interviews with type-experienced students, pilots and flying instructors. A flight test programme was conducted using examples of both aircraft types to gather additional research data, to assess and compare the apparent performance and handling qualities (both qualitatively and quantitatively). Flight tests were performed at three different CG conditions relevant to the key design differences, concentrating upon apparent longitudinal (static and dynamic) stability and control characteristics, stall and low-speed handling characteristics, and cockpit ergonomics / pilot workload. In all tests, normal (unmodified) flying club aircraft were used, in most cases with a 2-man (TP+FTE) crew. Data was recorded manually on test cards and automatically using a low-cost, commercially available, portable FDR. Proven theory was used to estimate static margins and pilot stick forces and gradients in the region of the stall, the pre-cursor to an LoC event.General Aviation Safety Council (GASCo

DOTS Awareness and the Myths and Misconceptions about DOTS among Medical Practitioners in Mysore

Background: Annually 2 million people in India develop Tuberculosis and 330,000 die. WHO-recommended DOTS strategy was pilot-tested in 1993 and launched as Revised National Tuberculosis Control Program (RNTCP) in 1997. Awareness of DOTS among the doctors in the private sector was appalling although nationwide coverage was attained by 2006. OBJECTIVE: To study awareness of DOTS among Medical Practitioners of urban and rural Mysore. Methodology: 401 Medical practitioners in hospitals and nursing homes of urban and rural areas of Mysore who treated Tuberculosis patients (private and public sector) were approached. They were grouped under different specialties as per the year of graduation (before or after introduction of DOTS). Results: 38 % doctors who graduated before the introduction of DOTS didn’t follow DOTS compared to 14.9% doctors who graduated later. 100% doctors working in Government sector felt that DOTS was better than daily regimen while 85% from the private sector felt so. Only 47.9% of the doctors in the private sector practiced DOTS compared to 95.1 % in the Govt. Sector. Hence, the number of doctors practicing DOTS in Private Sector was less than 50 % of that in the Govt. Sector. Both of these comparisons were found to be statistically highly significant (p<0.001). Awareness of DOTS was alarmingly low among Orthopedic Surgeons, Gynecologists and Pediatricians when compared to Physicians and General Practitioners. Conclusions: DOTS awareness is still low among doctors who graduated before the introduction of DOTS. Private practitioners harbored myths and misconceptions about DOTS

In search of a working notion of lex sportiva

The emergence of a lex specialis regime and its interaction with the established, governing lex generalis in their overlapping spheres of application is always an intriguing legal relationship to explore. In this article, the focus will be on the development of legal principles and rules that have been/can be collectively described as lex sportiva. However, it is notable that those involved in the consideration, usage and application of this notion have not agreed as to the scope and delimitation of the concept. It is debated whether lex sportiva exists in the first place, its legal sources and its purpose. The risk is for the concept becoming redundant when not vilified as a hidden strategy to exclude non-sports-related law from the ambit of sport. Through an examination of the different propositions to the framework of the term, this article will shed light on the existence, utility and limits of the development of this conceptualisation

Nominal Curvature Design of Circular HSC Columns Confined with Post-tensioned Steel Straps

This article proposes new parameters for the practical design of circular high-strength concrete (HSC) columns confined with an innovative Steel Strapping Tensioning Technique (SSTT) using a nominal curvature approach. Previous experimental research has proven the effectiveness of the SSTT at providing active confinement and enhancing the ductility of HSC columns, but to date no practical procedures are available so that the technique can be widely adopted in design practice. The proposed design approach is based on results from segmental analyses of slender SSTT-confined circular columns subjected to eccentric loads. The results obtained from the analyses are used to determine the variables governing the design of such columns. The use of the proposed design parameters predicts conservatively the capacity of small-scale slender HSC circular columns confined using the SSTT, and can be thus used in the practical design of reinforced concrete (RC) structures

Characteristics in stages of change and decisional balance among smokers: The burden of obstructive lung diseases (BOLD)-Australia study

Smoking cessation remains a health promotion target. Applying the Transtheoretical Model to Australian Burden of Obstructive Lung Diseases (BOLD) data, we examined differences in stages of change (SoC) and readiness to quit decisional behaviours. Factors were identified likely to influence readiness of smokers, ≥40 years old, to quit. Analysis was restricted to current smokers classified to one of three stages: pre-contemplation (PC), contemplation (C) or preparation (P) to quit. Their ability to balance positive and negative consequences was measured using decisional balance. Among 314 smokers, 43.0% females and 60.8% overweight/obese, the distribution of SoC was: 38.1% PC, 38.3% C and 23.5% P. Overweight/obesity was associated with readiness to quit in stages C and P and there were more negative than positive attitudes towards smoking in those stages. Males were significantly heavier smokers in PC and C stages. Females used smoking cessation medication more frequently in PC stage, were more embarrassed about smoking and had greater negative reinforcements from smoking. Age started smoking and factors related to smoking history were associated with readiness to quit and increased the odds of being in stage C or P. An overweight/obese smoker was likely to be contemplating or preparing to quit. In these stages, smokers have more negative attitudes toward smoking. Starting smoking later, taking advice on cessation from health providers and using quit medications indicate increased readiness to quit. Evaluating these factors in smokers and developing cessation gain-framed messages may prove useful to healthcare providers

On the Necessary Memory to Compute the Plurality in Multi-Agent Systems

We consider the Relative-Majority Problem (also known as Plurality), in which, given a multi-agent system where each agent is initially provided an input value out of a set of $k$ possible ones, each agent is required to eventually compute the input value with the highest frequency in the initial configuration. We consider the problem in the general Population Protocols model in which, given an underlying undirected connected graph whose nodes represent the agents, edges are selected by a globally fair scheduler. The state complexity that is required for solving the Plurality Problem (i.e., the minimum number of memory states that each agent needs to have in order to solve the problem), has been a long-standing open problem. The best protocol so far for the general multi-valued case requires polynomial memory: Salehkaleybar et al. (2015) devised a protocol that solves the problem by employing $O(k 2^k)$ states per agent, and they conjectured their upper bound to be optimal. On the other hand, under the strong assumption that agents initially agree on a total ordering of the initial input values, Gasieniec et al. (2017), provided an elegant logarithmic-memory plurality protocol. In this work, we refute Salehkaleybar et al.'s conjecture, by providing a plurality protocol which employs $O(k^{11})$ states per agent. Central to our result is an ordering protocol which allows to leverage on the plurality protocol by Gasieniec et al., of independent interest. We also provide a $\Omega(k^2)$-state lower bound on the necessary memory to solve the problem, proving that the Plurality Problem cannot be solved within the mere memory necessary to encode the output.Comment: 14 pages, accepted at CIAC 201