SEARCH · Search NASA

Results for “Pilot”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

SourceResearch connectionFrom yearThrough year

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 595 records · Page 33

All sources NASA NTRS DOE OSTI

NASA NTRS1961

A Fixed-Base-Simulator Study of the Ability of a Pilot to Establish Close Orbits Around the Moon

A study was made on a six-degree-of-freedom fixed-base simulator of the ability of human pilots to modify ballistic trajectories of a 5 space vehicle approaching the moon to establish a circular orbit about 50 miles above the lunar surface. The unmodified ballistic trajectories had miss distances from the lunar surface of from 40 to 80 miles, and a velocity range of from 8,200 to 8,700 feet per second at closest approach. The pilot was given control of the thrust (along the vehicle longitudinal axis) and torques about all three body axes. The information display given to the pilot was a hodograph of the vehicle rate of descent and circumferential velocity, an altimeter, and vehicle attitude and rate meters.

Queijo, M. J.↗

NASA NTRS1961

Dynamic Stability and Control Problems of Piloted Reentry from Lunar Missions

A fixed-base simulator investigation has been made of stability and control problems during piloted reentry from lunar missions. Reentries were made within constraints of acceleration and skipping, in which the pilot was given simulated navigation tasks of altitude and heading angle commands. Vehicles considered included a blunt-face, high-drag capsule, and a low-drag lifting cone, each of which had a trim lift-drag ratio of 0.5. With the provision of three-axis automatic damping, both vehicles were easily controlled through reentry after a brief pilot-training period. With all dampers out, safe reentries could be made and both vehicles were rated satisfactory for emergency operation. In damper-failure conditions resulting in inadequate Dutch roll damping, the lifting-cone vehicle exhibited control problems due to excessive dihedral effect and oscillatory acceleration effects.

Moul, Martin T.↗

NASA NTRS1961

Analytical and Preliminary Simulation Study of a Pilot's Ability to Control the Terminal Phase of a Rendezvous with Simple Optical Devices and a Timer

One method of controlling the terminal phase of a space rendezvous between two vehicles is first to correct the flight path of the controlled vehicle so that a constant line of sight is established between the vehicles. This correction is accomplished by thrusting normal to the sight line in a direction to arrest the angular motion of this line. Once this collision course has been established, the second step is to control the closure rate for a safe approach along the line of sight. Adequate control of this maneuver requires range and closure-rate information. A combined analytical and preliminary simulation study was conducted to determine the ability of a human pilot to control the rendezvous by this method using visual sightings made during the initial collision-course control to obtain the range and closure rate. The analytical phase of the study reviewed the geometric relations between the vehicles and formed the basis for techniques to transform the angular sightings into range and closure rate. A preliminary simulation was then made to investigate the accuracy of these techniques. The simulation consisted of an analog computer, an oscilloscope to represent the view a pilot would have-with a stabilized sight, and a timer. Results indicate that pilots, using an optical sight and a timer, can successfully arrest the angular motion of the line of sight between two rendezvous vehicles and obtain relative range and closure rate with sufficient accuracy to perform the final braking maneuver successfully.

Lineberry, Edgar C., Jr.↗

NASA NTRS1959

A Pilot Opinion Study of Lateral Control Requirements for Fighter-Type Aircraft

As part of a continuing NASA program of research on airplane handling qualities, a pilot opinion investigation has been made on the lateral control requirements of fighter aircraft flying in their combat speed range. The investigation was carried out using a stationary flight simulator and a moving flight simulator, and the flight simulator results were supplemented by research tests in actual flight. The flight simulator study was based on the presumption that the pilot rates the roll control of an airplane primarily on a single-degree-of-freedom basis; that is, control of angle of roll about the aircraft body axis being of first importance. From the assumption of a single degree of freedom system it follows that there are two fundamental parameters which govern the airplane roll response, namely the roll damping expressed as a time constant and roll control power in terms of roll acceleration. The simulator study resulted in a criterion in terms of these two parameters which defines satisfactory, unsatisfactory, and unacceptable roll performance from a pilot opinion standpoint. The moving simulator results were substantiated by the in-flight investigation. The derived criterion was compared with the roll performance criterion based upon wing tip helix angle and also with other roll performance concepts which currently influence the roll performance design of military fighter aircraft flying in their combat speed range.

Creer, Brent Y.↗

NASA NTRS1996

Life and Microgravity Sciences Spacelab Mission: Human Research Pilot Study

The Life Sciences, Microgravity Science and Spacelab Mission contains a number of human experiments directed toward identifying the functional, metabolic and neurological characteristics of muscle weakness and atrophy during space flight. To ensure the successful completion of the flight experiments, a ground-based pilot study, designed to mimic the flight protocols as closely as possible, was carried out in the head-down tilt bed rest model. This report records the rationales, procedures, preliminary results and estimated value of the pilot study, the first of its kind, for 12 of the 13 planned experiments in human research. The bed rest study was conducted in the Human Research Facility at Ames Research Center from July 11 - August 28, 1995. Eight healthy male volunteers performed the experiments before, during and after 17 days bed rest. The immediate purposes of this simulation were to integrate the experiments, provide data in a large enough sample for publication of results, enable investigators to review individual experiments in the framework of a multi-disciplinary study and relay the experience of the pilot study to the mission specialists prior to launch.

Arnaud, Sara B.↗

NASA NTRS1999

Performance Modeling of a Pilot in a Free Flight Mode: A Free Flight Self-Separation Cancellations Due to the Requirement for Procedural Intervention - 1

Developments are being made that allow pilots to have more flexibility over the control of their aircraft. This new concept is called Free Flight. Free Flight strives to move the current air traffic system into an age where space technology is used to its fullest potential. Self-separation is one part of the Free Flight system. Self-separation provides pilots the opportunity to choose their own route to reach a specified destination provided that they maintain the 'minimum required separation distance between airplanes. In the event that pilots are unable to maintain separation, controllers will need to have the aircraft separation authority passed back to them. This situation is known as a procedural intervention point. This project attempted to examine and diagnose those particular situations in an effort to avoid reaching a procedural intervention point in the near future. Crews that reached procedural intervention points were compared with crews that made similar maneuver types in the same scenario, but did not reach procedural intervention points. Results showed that there were no significant differences between crews in a high-density acute angle flight conditions. However, significant differences in maneuver times, following the detection of an intruder aircraft and following the time the intruder aircraft came into view, were found in a low-density, acute angle scenario.

Ntuen, Celestine A.↗

NASA NTRS1999

Effects of Inboard Horizontal Field of View Display Limitations on Pilot Path Control During Total In-Flight Simulator (TIFS) Flight Test

A flight test was conducted aboard Calspan's Total In-Flight Simulator (TIFS) aircraft by researchers within the External Visibility System (XVS) element of the High-Speed Research program. The purpose was to investigate the effects of inboard horizontal field of view (FOV) display limitations on pilot path control and to learn about the TIFS capabilities and limitations for possible use in future XVS flight tests. The TIFS cockpit windows were masked to represent the front XVS display area and the High-Speed Civil Transport side windows, as viewed by the pilot. Masking limited the forward FOV to 40 deg. horizontal and 50 deg. vertical for the basic flight condition, With an increase of 10 deg. horizontal in the inboard direction for the increased FOV flight condition. Two right-hand approach tasks (base-downwind-final) with a left crosswind on final were performed by three pilots using visual flight rules at Niagara Falls Airport. Each of the two tasks had three replicates for both horizontal FOV conditions, resulting in twelve approaches per test subject. Limited objective data showed that an increase of inboard FOV had no effect (deficiences in objective data measurement capabilities were noted). However, subjective results showed that a 50 deg. FOV was preferred over the 40 deg. FOV.

Kramer, Lynda J.↗

NASA NTRS1999

Initial Piloted Simulation Evaluation of the Reference-H High-Speed Civil Transport Design During Takeoff and Recovery From Limit Flight Conditions

An initial assessment of a proposed High-Speed Civil Transport (HSCT) was conducted in the fall of 1995 at the NASA Langley Research Center. This configuration, known as the Industry Reference-H (Ref.-H), was designed by the Boeing Aircraft Company as part of their work in the High Speed Research program. It included a conventional tail, a cranked-arrow wing, four mixed-flow turbofan engines, and capacity for transporting approximately 300 passengers. The purpose of this assessment was to evaluate and quantify operational aspects of the Reference-H configuration from a pilot's perspective with the additional goal of identifying design strengths as well as any potential configuration deficiencies. This study was aimed at evaluating the Ref.-H configuration at many points of the aircraft's envelope to determine the suitability of the vehicle to accomplish typical mission profiles as well as emergency or envelope-limit conditions. Pilot-provided Cooper-Harper ratings and comments constituted the primary vehicle evaluation metric. The analysis included simulated real-time piloted evaluations, performed in a 6 degree of freedom motion base NASA Langley Visual-Motion Simulator, combined with extensive bath analysis. The assessment was performed using the third major release of the simulation data base (known as Ref.-H cycle 2B).

Glaab, Louis J.↗

NASA NTRS1999

Piloted Simulation Study of the Effects of High-Lift Aerodynamics on the Takeoff Noise of a Representative High-Speed Civil Transport

As part of an effort between NASA and private industry to reduce airport-community noise for high-speed civil transport (HSCT) concepts, a piloted simulation study was initiated for the purpose of predicting the noise reduction benefits that could result from improved low-speed high-lift aerodynamic performance for a typical HSCT configuration during takeoff and initial climb. Flight profile and engine information from the piloted simulation were coupled with the NASA Langley Aircraft Noise Prediction Program (ANOPP) to estimate jet engine noise and to propagate the resulting source noise to ground observer stations. A baseline aircraft configuration, which also incorporated different levels of projected improvements in low-speed high-lift aerodynamic performance, was simulated to investigate effects of increased lift and lift-to-drag ratio on takeoff noise levels. Simulated takeoff flights were performed with the pilots following a specified procedure in which either a single thrust cutback was performed at selected altitudes ranging from 400 to 2000 ft, or a multiple-cutback procedure was performed where thrust was reduced by a two-step process. Results show that improved low-speed high-lift aerodynamic performance provides at least a 4 to 6 dB reduction in effective perceived noise level at the FAA downrange flyover measurement station for either cutback procedure. However, improved low-speed high-lift aerodynamic performance reduced maximum sideline noise levels only when using the multiple-cutback procedures.

Glaab, Louis J.↗

NASA NTRS1999

Transition to Glass: Pilot Training for High-Technology Transport Aircraft

This report examines the activities of a major commercial air carrier between 1993 and late 1996 as it acquired an advanced fleet of high-technology aircraft (Boeing 757). Previously, the airline's fleet consisted of traditional (non-glass) aircraft, and this report examines the transition from a traditional fleet to a glass one. A total of 150 pilots who were entering the B-757 transition training volunteered for the study, which consisted of three query phases: (1) first day of transition training, (2) 3 to 4 months after transition training, and (3) 12 to 14 months after initial operating experience. Of these initial 150 pilots, 99 completed all three phases of the study, with each phase consisting of probes on attitudes and experiences associated with their training and eventual transition to flying the line. In addition to the three questionnaires, 20 in-depth interviews were conducted. Although the primary focus of this study was on the flight training program, additional factors such as technical support, documentation, and training aids were investigated as well. The findings generally indicate that the pilot volunteers were highly motivated and very enthusiastic about their training program. In addition, the group had low levels of apprehension toward automation and expressed a high degree of satisfaction toward their training. However, there were some concerns expressed regarding the deficiencies in some of the training aids and lack of a free-play flight management system training device.

Wiener, Earl L.↗

NASA NTRS2000

Pilot Personality Profile Using the NEO-PI-R

This paper recounts the qualitative research conducted to determine if a general personality measure would provide a personality profile for commercial aviation pilots. The researchers investigated a widely used general personality inventory, the NEO-PI-R, with 93 pilots. The results indicate that a "pilot personality" does exist. Future research and implications are discussed.

Fitzgibbons, Amy↗

NASA NTRS2000

Realistic Radio Communications in Pilot Simulator Training

Simulators used for total training and evaluation of airline pilots must satisfy stringent criteria in order to assure their adequacy for training and checking maneuvers. Air traffic control and company radio communications simulation, however, may still be left to role-play by the already taxed instructor/evaluators in spite of their central importance in every aspect of the flight environment. The underlying premise of this research is that providing a realistic radio communications environment would increase safety by enhancing pilot training and evaluation. This report summarizes the first-year efforts of assessing the requirement and feasibility of simulating radio communications automatically. A review of the training and crew resource/task management literature showed both practical and theoretical support for the need for realistic radio communications simulation. A survey of 29 instructor/evaluators from 14 airlines revealed that radio communications are mainly role-played by the instructor/evaluators. This increases instructor/evaluators' own workload while unrealistically lowering pilot communications load compared to actual operations, with a concomitant loss in training/evaluation effectiveness. A technology review searching for an automated means of providing radio communications to and from aircraft with minimal human effort showed that while promising, the technology is still immature. Further research and the need for establishing a proof-of-concept are also discussed.

Burki-Cohen, Judith↗

NASA NTRS1994

Collaboration in Controller-Pilot Communication

Like other forms of dialogue, air traffic control (ATC) communication is an act of collaboration between two or more people. Collaboration progresses more or less smoothly depending on speaker and listener strategies. For example, we have found that the way controllers organize and deliver messages influences how easily pilots understand these messages, which in turn determines how much time and effort is needed to successfully complete the transaction. In this talk, I will introduce a collaborative framework for investigating controller-pilot communication and then describe a set of studies that investigate ATC communication from two complementary directions. First, we focused on the impact of ATC message factors (e.g., length, speech rate) on the cognitive processes involved in ATC: communication. Second, we examined pilot factors that influence the amount of cognitive resources available for these communication processes. These studies also illustrate how the collaborate framework can help analyze the impact of proposed visual data link systems on ATC communication. Examining the joint effects of communication medium, message factors, and pilot/controller factors on performance should help improve air safety and communication efficiency. Increased efficiency is important for meeting the growing demands on the National Air System.

Morrow, Daniel↗

NASA NTRS1994

Initial Field Evaluation of Pilot Procedures for Flying CTAS Descent Clearances

The Center TRACON Automation System (CTAS) is a new support system that is designed to assist air traffic controllers in the management of arrival traffic. CTAS will provide controllers with more information about current air traffic, enabling them to provide clearances for efficient, conflict-free descents that help achieve an orderly stream of aircraft at the final approach fix. CTAS is a computer-based system that functions as a "ground-based FMS" that can predict flight trajectories and arrival times for all incoming aircraft. CTAS uses an aircraft's cruise airspeed; current air traffic, winds and temperature; performance characteristics of the aircraft type; and individual airline preferences to create a flight profile from cruise altitude to the final approach fix. Controllers can use this flight profile to provide a descent clearance that will allow an aircraft to fly an efficient descent and merge more smoothly with other arriving aircraft. A field test of the CTAS Descent Advisor software was conducted at the Denver Center for aircraft arriving at the Stapleton International Airport from September 12-29. CTAS Descent clearances were given to a NASA flight test aircraft and to 77 airline flights that arrived during low traffic periods. For the airline portion of the field test, cockpit procedures and pilot briefing packages for both FMS equipped and unequipped aircraft were developed in cooperation with an airline. The procedures developed for the FMS equipped aircraft were to fly a VNAV descent at a controller specified speed to cross a metering fix at a specified altitude and speed. For nonFMS aircraft, the clearance also specified a CTAS calculated top-of-descent point. Some CTAS related flight deck issues included how much time was available to the pilots' for compliance, the amount of information that needed to be interpreted in the clearance and possible repercussions of misunderstandings. Data collected during the study ranged from subjective data (including the airline pilots' opinions and comments about the new descent clearances and procedures) to objective data (including observations of aircraft performance from the flight deck). This paper will present data and the resulting changes in the design of the procedures and clearance phraseology.

Palmer, Everett↗

NASA NTRS2001

The Effect of Ownship Information and NexRad Resolution on Pilot Decision Making in the Use of a Cockpit Weather Information Display

A two-phase experiment was conducted to explore the effects of data-link weather displays upon pilot decision performance. The experiment was conducted with 49 instrument rated pilots who were divided into four groups and placed in a simulator with a realistic flight scenario involving weather containing convective activity. The inflight weather display depicted NEXRAD images, with graphical and textual METARs over a moving map display. The experiment explored the effect of weather information, ownship position symbology and NEXRAD cell size resolution. The phase-two experiment compared two groups using the data-linked weather display with ownship position symbology. These groups were compared to the phase-one group that did not have ownship position symbology. The phase-two pilots were presented with either large NEXRAD cell size (8 km) or small cell size (4 km). Observations noted that the introduction of ownship symbology did not appear to significantly impact the decision making process, however, the introduction of ownship did reduce workload. Additionally, NEXRAD cell size resolution did appear to influence the tactical decision making process.

Novacek, Paul F.↗

NASA NTRS1996

Experimental Study of Collision Detection Schema Used by Pilots During Closely Spaced Parallel Approaches

An experimental flight simulator study was conducted to examine the mental alerting logic and thresholds used by subjects to issue an alert and execute an avoidance maneuver. Subjects flew a series of autopilot landing approaches with traffic on a closely-spaced parallel approach; during some runs, the traffic would deviate towards the subject and the subject was to indicate the point when they recognized the potential traffic conflict, and then indicate a direction of flight for an avoidance maneuver. A variety of subjects, including graduate students, general aviation pilots and airline pilots, were tested. Five traffic displays were evaluated, with a moving map TCAS-type traffic display as a baseline. A side-task created both high and low workload situations. Subjects appeared to use the lateral deviation of the intruder aircraft from its approach path as the criteria for an alert regardless of the display available. However, with displays showing heading and/or trend information, their alerting thresholds were significantly lowered. This type of range-only schema still resulted in many near misses, as a high convergence rate was often established by the time of the subject's alert. Therefore, the properties of the intruder's trajectory had the greatest effect on the resultant near miss rate; no display system reliably caused alerts timely enough for certain collision avoidance. Subjects' performance dropped significantly on a side-task while they analyzed the need for an alert, showing alert generation can be a high workload situation at critical times. No variation was found between subjects with and with out piloting experience. These results suggest the design of automatic alerting systems should take into account the range-type alerting schema used by the human, such that the rationale for the automatic alert should be obvious to, and trusted by, the operator. Although careful display design may help generate pilot/automation trust, issues such as user non-conformance to automatically generated commands can remain a possibility.

Pritchett, Amy R.↗

NASA NTRS1992

An Experimental Study of the Effects of Automation on Pilot Situational Awareness in the Datalink ATC Environment

An experiment to study how automation, when used in conjunction with datalink for the delivery of air traffic control (ATC) clearance amendments, affects the situational awareness of aircrews was conducted. The study was focused on the relationship of situational awareness to automated Flight Management System (FMS) programming and the readback of ATC clearances. Situational awareness was tested by issuing nominally unacceptable ATC clearances and measuring whether the error was detected by the subject pilots. The experiment also varied the mode of clearance delivery: Verbal, Textual, and Graphical. The error detection performance and pilot preference results indicate that the automated programming of the FMS may be superior to manual programming. It is believed that automated FMS programming may relieve some of the cognitive load, allowing pilots to concentrate on the strategic implications of a clearance amendment. Also, readback appears to have value, but the small sample size precludes a definite conclusion. Furthermore, because textual and graphical modes of delivery offer different but complementary advantages for cognitive processing, a combination of these modes of delivery may be advantageous in a datalink presentation.

Hahn, Edward C.↗

NASA NTRS1993

Preliminary Analysis of Pilot Ratings of "Party Line" Information Importance

With the introduction of digital data link communications into the ATC system, there is concern over the potential loss of situational awareness by flight crews due to the reduction in the 'Party Line' Information (PLI). This information is available to the pilot by overhearing communications between ATC and other aircraft. A survey was distributed to determine current PLI use by several pilot operational groups, experience levels and geographic regions. The survey identified numerous important elements. PLI was rated the highest for operations near or on approach to the airport. Several significant variations were found between pilots from different operational groups and experience levels. Traffic and weather information were the most frequently cited as information required to obtain global situation awareness.

Pritchett, Amy↗