Test techniques for evaluating flight displays

The rapid development of graphics technology allows for greater flexibility in aircraft displays, but display evaluation techniques have not kept pace. Historically, display evaluation has been based on subjective opinion and not on the actual aircraft/pilot performance. Existing electronic display specifications and evaluation techniques are reviewed. A display rating technique analogous to handling qualities ratings was developed and is recommended for future evaluations. The choice of evaluation pilots is also discussed and the use of a limited number of trained evaluators is recommended over the use of a large number of operational pilots

Advanced helicopter cockpit and control configurations for helicopter combat missions

Two piloted simulations were conducted by the U.S. Army Aeroflightdynamics Directorate to evaluate workload and helicopter-handling qualities requirements for single pilot operation in a combat Nap-of-the-Earth environment. The single-pilot advanced cockpit engineering simulation (SPACES) investigations were performed on the NASA Ames Vertical Motion Simulator, using the Advanced Digital Optical Control System control laws and an advanced concepts glass cockpit. The first simulation (SPACES I) compared single pilot to dual crewmember operation for the same flight tasks to determine differences between dual and single ratings, and to discover which control laws enabled adequate single-pilot helicopter operation. The SPACES II simulation concentrated on single-pilot operations and use of control laws thought to be viable candidates for single pilot operations workload. Measures detected significant differences between single-pilot task segments. Control system configurations were task dependent, demonstrating a need for inflight reconfigurable control system to match the optimal control system with the required task

The Role of Alerting System Failures in Loss of Control Accidents CAST SE-210 Output 2

This report is part of a series of reports that address flight deck design and evaluation, written as a response to loss of control accidents. In particular, this activity is directed at failures in airplane state awareness in which the pilot loses awareness of the airplane's energy state or attitude and enters an upset condition. In a report by the Commercial Aviation Safety Team, an analysis of accidents and incidents related to loss of airplane state awareness determined that hazard alerting was not effective in producing the appropriate pilot response to a hazard (CAST, 2014). In the current report, we take a detailed look at 28 airplane state awareness accidents and incidents to determine how well the hazard alerting worked. We describe a five-step integrated alerting-to-recovery sequence that prescribes how hazard alerting should lead to effective flight crew actions for managing the hazard. Then, for each hazard in each of the 28 events, we determine if that sequence failed and, if so, how it failed. The results show that there was an alerting failure in every one of the 28 safety events, and that the most frequent failure (20/28) was tied to the flight crew not orienting to (not being aware of) the hazard. The discussion section summarizes findings and identifies alerting issues that are being addressed and issues that are not currently being addressed. We identify a few recent upgrades that have addressed certain alerting failures. Two of these upgrades address alerting design, but one response to the safety events is to upgrade training for approach to stall and stall recovery. We also describe issues that are not being addressed adequately: better alert integration for flight path management types of hazards, airplanes in the fleet that do not meet the current alerting regulations, a lack of innovation for addressing cases of channelized attention, and existing vulnerabilities in managing data validity

Flight-Control-Force-Exertion Limits and Comparisons with Pilot and Nonpilot Populations

This study was conducted to update data on the force that pilots (and nonpilots) can apply to flight controls so that current performance data could be compared with values for maximum allowable control forces found in sections of the Code of Federal Regulations (14 CFR 23.143 and 25.143). We compared these tabular values with several later samples of human performance to determine what proportion of the potential and actual pilot populations might be able to exert those levels of force. We then obtained data for 12 female general aviation pilots and 12 female nonpilots as well as data for 32 male scheduled-carrier pilots for comparison with previously documented data and with the values in the CFR. 83% the female pilots were not able to exert force to the levels shown in the tables for some of the 10 primary tasks. However, only 12.5% of the male scheduled-carrier pilots did not achieve the tabled force levels for some tasks. Results were examined by task and force-application dimension