Embry-Riddle Researchers Combat Flight Deck Disorientation

Embry-Riddle researchers are using a Tactile SituationAwareness System (TSAS) to combat flight deck disorientation. Four hours oftraining – that’s all it takes to attack the problem of spatial disorientation amongpilots, and to save their lives, according to Dr. Braden McGrath, researchprofessor in Embry-Riddle’s Department of Human Factors and BehavioralNeurobiology.

Spatial disorientation in flight occurs when what pilotsfeel clashes with reality – when they believe they’re flying upward but theirplane is actually headed toward the ground, for example. Blinking lights,heads-up displays and a variety of other safety controls are already availablein the flight deck to counteract this occurrence, but those features are allvisual, said McGrath, who conducted his doctoral thesis on this topic andbelieves that the complete solution lies in also using another of our fivesenses: touch.

“Tactile cueing keeps pilots aware: It gives them the rightinformation at the right time and in the right modality,” he said. “It keepsthem in the loop.”

Many pilots who find their vision obstructed or attentiondistracted are not in the loop, however, and they might not even realize it.That’s where TSAS comes in – a device invented by Dr. Angus Rupert of the U.S.Army Aeromedical Research Laboratory that vibrates at different locations andintensities along a pilot’s torso, alerting him or her to irregularities in anaircraft’s orientation. If a plane is rolling slightly left, for instance, thevest will lightly rumble on the pilot’s left side, and it will continue to doso until the roll is corrected.

By utilizing vibration, the vest takes visuals and evenintellectual processing out of the equation. Pilots don’t need to be able tosee or read controls. They only need four hours of training, and then they’refluent.

TSAS also works to address a problem that can affect anyaviator at any experience level.

“The Air Force has never lost less than five pilots per yeardue to spatial disorientation,” he said. “They lost more than 150 aircraft and150 pilots from the 1980s to the early 2000s.”

But TSAS, a fireproof garment with miniature tactileactuators sewn inside of it, can change all that. And graduate students areworking hard to make sure it does.

Before pilots can utilize the haptic vest in the air, theyneed training – from grad students Tyson Richards and Qianhong “Echo” Liu.

Risks are eliminated in virtual worlds, however, and sobefore test subjects are ever equipped with tactile belts on the flight line,they go to the Aerospace Physiology Lab, strap on a 3-D headset and tactilebelt, and learn to read the rumbles they feel pulsing up and down their sidesevery time the yoke on their simulator leans off-center.

Once pilots acclimate and can reorient using just signalsfrom the tactile belt’s actuators, even with their eyes closed and aftersimulating mid-flight barrel rolls, they’re ready for the real world.

With an unobstructed pilot safely controlling the aircraftfrom the left seat, Richards and Liu set up their test subjects in the rightseat and outfit them with a tactile belt. Just like in training, the goal isfor the subject to use the belt’s tactile cues to prove that they understandwhere the horizon line is – even though most of tests are conducted at night,and in one of the five test scenarios, they wear either a blindfold or a pairof tinted goggles, simulating poor visual environments where spatialdisorientation is most common. Afterward, Richards and Liu conduct post-flightinterviews to compare the pilot’s perceptions to what they actuallyexperienced.

“In the classroom, you just kind of hear about some of thesethings, but being able to see it in practical application – and actually dosomething about solving it – is different,” says Richards, who serves as anactive-duty member of the U.S. Coast Guard. “Every single time we do thesetrials, there is always something unscripted. It’s always a challenge and youhave to solve problems and come up with solutions to make it work.”