An RTCA committee formed to lay the ground work for how pilots might "see" the world outside the cockpit in the not-too-distant future has begun revealing snippets of how that brave new world might look.
Two vdeos recently made public by RTCA special comittee 213, a group tasked with coming up with minimum aviation system performance standards (MASPS) that could lead to minimum operational performance standards (MOPS) for synthetic vision and enhanced vision systems, show some of the possiblities.
A key goal of the Federal Aviation Administration is to have the tools available for pilots to fly as if they are in visual conditions no matter what the actual weather or even if the aircraft doesn't have any forward-looking windows, an advancement that will increase capacity and safety. The agency in the past has called the capability "equivalent visual operations".
Related to that, the first video shows how a back seat rider in a NASA F-18B was able to fly approaches, landings and taxiing using only high definition imagery on a screen in front of him while the rest of the canopy was blacked out. A safety pilot was flying in the front seat, ready to take over at any minute.
The second video shows how an approach to Martha's Vineyard in a business jet in low clouds looks to a pilot equipped with a Kollsman EVS II enhanced vision system. Currently, those equipped can use the EVS II with head-up display to extend their Category 1 instrument approaches down to as low as 100ft above the ground before observing the runway environment with their natural eyes, as opposed to 200ft without the EVS aid.
Part of SC 213's latest work is looking at what it might take to decrease that 100ft "unaided" decision height down to zero feet...
on August 19, 2009 1:50 PM | Reply
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