Search

The methods and procedures within United States naval aviation to certify an aircraft safe for flight are well established. However, these methods and procedures are based on clearing a system that is operated or monitored by a human. A fully autonomous system will not have a human in or on the loop and will therefore require a new method for certifying it safe for flight. This paper details how to use run time assurance as the framework for a safety of flight certification of autonomous behavior within United States naval aviation. We present an aerial refueling task with run time assurance as use case for the framework for certification. Within the use case we then give more details on the mechanics of using RTA to enable autonomous functionality within naval aviation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most of the existing literature on crisis communication focuses on the crisis response immediately following a crisis. There is a dearth of research examining postcrisis communication efforts. Postcrisis communication is especially important in the context of tragic crises, which leave stakeholders deeply affected and traumatized. This paper examines the multifaceted nature of memorials and their significance in postcrisis communication. Using the 2015 Germanwings crash as an illustrative case study, the paper highlights how memorials serve as artifacts of grief, remembrance and celebration of life. Postcrisis communication that centres on victim needs is a keystone to better crisis management. Moreover, I argue that postcrisis communication should facilitate healing by serving the needs of victims, which supersede those of organizations. The paper examines the notions of victim‐centred crisis communication and ethics of care by looking at memorials as artefacts of postcrisis communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To address growing system complexity in the aerospace industry, a Model‐Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) approach has been increasingly adopted for the development of aircraft systems. This calls for a corresponding approach for performing safety assessment to maintain consistency between the system and safety domains. One of the key safety assessment processes for aircraft development is the Functional Hazard Assessment (FHA). The purpose of this paper is to build upon previously published works and introduce the MBFHA framework which describes the language, method, and tool needed for implementing a model‐based approach to performing FHA and integrating it into MBSE activities. A customised FHA profile is introduced for the modelling language, an overall workflow along with processes for FHA report and safety requirements generation is presented for the method, and a list of tool constraints is provided. A proof‐of‐concept is subsequently presented using safety data for the landing gear extension and retraction system of a generic business aircraft. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a Bayesian search methodology in the context of missing aircraft, as well as a few other related search operations. The search seeks an item hidden in one of n cells. The parameters controlling the search are the prior probabilities (updated during each phase of the search) and the search quality. Assume the search begins in the area with the maximal prior. The expected length of the search depends on how far the item is from that locale (in essence a measure of the quality of the prior), and the search effectiveness parameter. A perfect (error free) search could find the item in a number of steps as a function of the distance of the object from the starting location. Lower quality search can take a lot longer, though it can ultimately be effective. The Bayesian process works by guiding us to the higher likelihood areas based on the results of failed search. It adds value by eliminating unlikely possibilities. The search can have an element of luck in starting its exploration close to the actual item. Real searches, where this was true, were in fact ultimately successful; real searches which were not so fortunate ended in failure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the usage of a systemic neutralized taxonomy for understanding human factors to foster a restorative culture when studying adverse events. The available studies supporting accident analysis from a system‐theoretic perspective with human factors‐based methods are grounded on error taxonomies and do not reinforce the non‐judgemental dimension that is encouraged by modern safety science. We propose a methodology to integrate the system‐theoretic accident analysis technique, Causal Analysis based on System Theory, with a neutralized taxonomy of human explanatory factors. The proposed methodology has been applied to an aviation accident involving a military aircraft and a glider. This case revealed various critical interactions among system components, which require dedicated safety recommendations that go beyond the identification of single points of failures and root causes, leading to a deeper understanding of socio‐technical orchestrations. Despite the use case in aviation, the proposed methodology remains suitable for various types of safety occurrences in diverse domains and industrial settings. It also represents the basis for supporting future proactive safety‐related decision‐making processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a solution for the formation flight problem for multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) cooperating to execute a required mission. Learning BasedModel Predictive Control (LBMPC) is implemented on the team of UAVs in order to accomplish the required formation. All flight simulations respect Reynold's rules of flocking to avoid UAV collisions with nearby flockmates, match the team members velocity and stay close to each other during the formation. The main contribution of this paper lies in the application of LBMPC to solve the problem of formation for an autonomous team of UAVs. The proposed solution is theoretically, by the application of analysis to the problem, demonstrated to be stable. Moreover, simulations support the findings of the paper. Themain contributions of this paper are the proposed LBMPC formulation for formation of vehicles with uncertainty in their models, and the theoretical analysis of the solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to explore the human factors and systems dynamics of human–machine interaction by reference to the Kegworth aircraft accident. The paper seeks to move beyond the more traditional human factors literature to include research findings from both systems research and crisis management in an attempt to examine the relationships between active and latent failures. The role of human error within complex technical systems is explored and particular emphasis is placed upon the dynamics of latent errors within the management of such systems. The main thesis developed here is that, while there are important cognitive processes at work within accident causation, attention needs to be moved away from the level of the operator to the wider managerial and social frameworks within which individuals work. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper discusses flight-path planning for an aircraft flying at low altitude while avoiding terrain crashes,. In a past study, several algorithms based on exploratory procedures have been proposed; however, they do not generatye practical path that take into account aircraft practical pathe that take into account aircraft inertia. This paper proposes a new algorithm to generate a flight path taking account of the aircraft's inertia; this algorithm does not generate the flight path directly, but determines the aircraft's staring acceleration at every point along the way and then generates the flight path based on the steering acceleration. This algorithm extracts feature perimeters repreenting a relation between the aircraft and the terrain, determines steering acceleration by fuzzy reasoning using the feature parameters, and updates state variables of the aircraft. Furthermore, this paper also proposes a learning algorithm to design the membership values in the fuzzy resoning from reference flights since it is difficult to optimize them by trial and error. The flight-path planning by the proposed algorithm is corporate with that bested on the exploratory procedure. The learning algorithm of the membership values is validated through computer simulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a review paper of studies that have employed the functional resonance analysis method (FRAM). FRAM is a relatively new systemic method for modeling and analyzing complex socio‐technical systems. This review aims to address the following research questions: (a) Why is FRAM used? (b) To what domains has FRAM been applied? (c) What are the appropriate data collection approaches in practice? (d) What are the deficiencies of FRAM? A review of 52 FRAM‐related studies published between 2010 and 2020 revealed that FRAM‐based models can be used as a basis for improving safety management, accident/incident investigation, hazard identification/risk management, and complexity management in complex socio‐technical systems. The outcomes also showed that healthcare was the most common domain that employed FRAM (31% of the investigated studies). The results of exploring data collection methods indicated a mixed method (interview, focus group, observation) was employed in 52% of the analyzed studies, and the accident investigation report was the most popular approach in aviation‐related studies. An investigation of the deficiencies of the FRAM showed that it should be upgraded by exploiting supplementary methods to enhance its analytical and computational capacity to help risk analysts and safety managers in complex socio‐technical systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT Turbulence is a major source of weather-related aviation incidents. There are many different indicators used to try and predict where turbulence is likely to occur. The indicators are derived from deterministic models although they are often quoted as probabilities. This paper proposes the use of ensemble forecasts from the Met Office Global and Regional Ensemble Prediction System ( MOGREPS) to produce a probabilistic indicator of wind shear and convectively induced moderate or greater turbulence. An objective verification scheme using high-resolution automated aircraft observations from the Global Aircraft Data Set is used to compare the skill with the routinely available World Area Forecast Centre gridded turbulence forecasts. The forecasts are assessed globally over a 12 month period from November 2010 to October 2011 looking at the skill, reliability and economic value of the forecasts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: This paper deals with optimal control applied to one of the most crucial and challenging problems in Air Traffic Management that of aircraft conflict avoidance. We propose an optimal control model where aircraft separation is achieved by changing the speeds of aircraft, and the integral over a time window of their squared accelerations is minimized. Pairwise aircraft separation constraints constitute the main difficulties to be handled. We propose an original decomposition of the problem into 3 zones, in such a way that in two of them, no conflict occurs. Then, using the Pontryagin maximum principle, 2 new formulations of the original optimal control problem are proposed and solved via direct shooting methods. Thanks to our decomposition, these numerical methods are applied on subproblems having reduced size with respect to the original one, thus improving the efficiency of the solution process. Thirty problem instances are numerically solved, showing the effectiveness of the proposed approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT Currently, most civil and military UAS operations are taking place in segregated airspace so that collision avoidance and separation with other traffic is of minor concern. To further enable the UAS operational scope, Unmanned Aircraft (UA) must be able to fly in airspace where other traffic is operating as well. This becomes increasingly important when considering the effects on efficiency and safety caused by the participation of UAS in the approaching and departing traffic at (civil) hub airports. Enabling a smooth integration of UA into the traffic stream of an airport requires the examination of two different aspects. One important aspect is the handling of UA Beyond Visual Line Of Sight (BVLOS) under the requirement of wake vortex separation and a sustained Air Traffic Control (ATC) communication. A second aspect that needs to be considered is the potential of improving current UAS approach procedures and their effect on airport capacity. In this paper, a concept is presented, in which a single generic Ground Control Station (GCS), located at or near the airport can be used to control multiple UAS and, in conjunction with advanced GBAS approach procedures, can facilitate the shared use of an airport. Copyright © 2013 Institute of Navigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The probability of mid-air and near-mid-air collisions in terminal areas depends on a variety of factors such as visibility, number of air traffic controllers, communication channels, terrain, mix of aircraft and aircraft speeds, local densities of air traffic in specific subregions surrounding airports, as well as other measures of congestion. We develop, with the use of influence diagrams, a probabilistic model to analyze and predict mid-air and near-mid-air collisions. The probability of near-mid-air and mid-air collisions in the model is influenced by weather, traffic density, detection and collision avoidance maneuvres. Low-hazard near-mid-air collisions (LNMACs) can escalate to critical near-mid-air collisions (CNMACs) and eventually to a mid-air collision (MAC) with the probability of escalation reduced through the use of a collision-avoidance system. The predictive probability of a collision in the model is the product of three factors-density, effectiveness of the collision-avoidance system, and the conditional probability that independently of the collision-avoidance system a CNMAC escalates, by chance alone, to a MAC. The paper obtains several conclusions based on sensitivity analysis of the model. Under the assumption that new designs of collision-avoidance systems will result in much higher detection probabilities than presently available, it is important that both aircraft use the system if there is to be a significant improvement in collision avoidance. For maximum benefit, these collision- avoidance systems should not reduce the probabilities of avoidance given that a near-mid-air collision has been detected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the wealth impact on aircraft manufacturers of crashes involving their aircraft. We attempt to separate out the regulatory, tort law, and endogenous market components of these costs using stock market data. The results indicate that on average the manufacturer suffers a wealth loss of $21.3 million as the result of a fatal crash in which the structural integrity of the aircraft is at issue. The analysis suggests that not all of this amount can be attributed to regulatory or tort law mechanisms, and that market forces play a role in providing air travel safety. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes ground-based ave for horizontal maneuvers using a concept of potential as a collision avoidance aircraft procedure. First, mathematical formulation is introduced by using potential as a way to systematically represent the conditions contributing to collision avoidance such as a threat of collision with other aircraft and degrees of deviation front the original course. The flight course with a tower potential is considered safer. In the choice of a specific avoidance course, an avoidance pattern generation method by means of potential gradient is shown. The future location of the aircraft is sampled at a certain time interval. The shift of the sampling point corresponding to the potential gradient at each sampling point or the force applied to each sampling point (attractive or repulsive) is repeated. It was confirmed that by means of this method, avoidance patterns without danger of collision can be obtained with only horizontal avoidance except for special cases. However, when the sampling points are symmetric or when more than three aircraft are involved, the procedure is not adequate and some provisions are needed. To this end, the sampling point arrangement in the initial stage before the avoidance pattern is formed and the three-dimensional avoidance including vertical avoidance can be considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the morning of 5 March 2010, an aircraft experienced tail strike when it departed from the south runway of the Hong Kong International Airport to the west. This paper documents the meteorological conditions in the tail strike event, and discusses the alerting and the forecasting aspects of the event. Based on the analysis of the aircraft manufacturer, the tail strike is believed to arise from significant wind shear (headwind loss) experienced by the aircraft. By analysing the surface and the LIDAR observations, it appears that the significant wind shear is related to disruption of the background southwesterly flow by the complex terrain near the airport. From the surface observations, there is a microscale cyclone at the western part of the south runway. The radial velocity image of the LIDAR also depicts an area of reverse flow in that region against the background southerly flow. The alerting of the wind shear based on the two wind shear alerting algorithms developed by the Hong Kong Observatory is discussed, and it turns out that the anemometer-based wind shear algorithm could successfully capture this wind shear occurring close to the ground. On the other hand, due to geometrical constraint, the LIDAR does not pick up the headwind loss experienced by the aircraft. The forecasting of this wind shear event is considered by performing high resolution (down to a horizontal resolution of 50 m) using a mesoscale numerical weather prediction model. The simulated headwind profile at the event time is generally consistent with the aircraft data, though the headwind loss in the simulation is smaller than the reality. Together with the forecast wind gusts, it may be possible to alert the aviation weather forecaster at an earlier time about the occurrence of terrain-induced wind shear over the south runway in this particular event. Copyright © 2011 Royal Meteorological Society [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The idea of creating collective aerial systems is appealing because several rather simple flying vehicles could join forces to cover a large area in little time in applications such as monitoring, mapping, search and rescue, or airborne communication relays. In most of these scenarios, a fleet of cooperating vehicles is dispatched to a confined airspace area and requested to fly close to a nominal altitude. Moreover, depending on the task each vehicle is assigned to, individual flight trajectories in this essentially two-dimensional space may interfere, resulting in disastrous collisions. This paper begins by introducing a probabilistic model to predict the rate of midair collisions that would occur if nothing is done to prevent them. In a second step, a control strategy for midair collision avoidance is proposed, which is interesting because it requires only local communication and information about flight altitudes. The proposed strategy is systematically analyzed in theory and simulation as well as in experiments with five physical aerial vehicles. A significant reduction in collision rates can be achieved. Statistically, values close to zero are possible when the swarm's density is below an application-dependent threshold. Such low collision rates warrant an acceptable level of confidence in collision-free operation of a physical swarm. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research investigated how new or previously unrecognized risks are identified in organizations by risk managers. Managing risk is an increasingly important and widespread task in modern organizations, and the initial identification of risks is one of the key challenges of risk management. However, the psychological processes through which risks are initially identified and interpreted in organizations remain unclear. This paper presents a qualitative study of airline flight safety investigators. The interpretive processes, knowledge, and assumptions underlying risk identification in this setting were examined. The findings suggest that risks were initially identified through an interpretive process of finding gaps or inadequacies in investigators' current knowledge. Investigators engaged in interpretive processes that aimed to construct small moments of doubt, where current knowledge was found to be questionable or suspect in some way. These interpretive processes were underpinned by assumptions that organizational knowledge was inherently limited, partial, and fallible. The implications of these findings are discussed in relation to theories of organizational sensemaking, decision-making, and expertise, and practices of risk management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the impact of a strict product liability standard on the accident rate in the general aviation (GA) industry. Liability expenses increased by 775% between 1976 and 1986, reducing the sales of new GA aircraft by 90% and increasing the age of the GA fleet. Using both aggregate and model-specific data, our results indicate that the increase in the age of the GA fleet increased the accident rate by 25%–35% during 1981–2000. In addition, the higher price of GA aircraft boosted sales of homebuilt planes, which have higher accident and fatality rates than GA aircraft. ( JEL K13, L62, L15) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Term Redundancy Method (TRM) is a novel approach for obtaining ultra-reliable programs through specification-based testing. Current specification-based testing schemes need a prohibitively large number of test cases for estimating ultra-reliability. They assume the availability of an accurate program-usage distribution prior to testing, and they assume the availability of a test oracle. This paper shows how to obtain ultra-reliable abstract data types specified with equational specifications, with a practical number of test cases, without an accurate usage distribution, and without the usual test oracle. The effectiveness of the TRM in failure detection and recovery is demonstrated on the aircraft collision avoidance system TCAS. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper critically analyzes the use of English in the field of aviation. International air traffic has played an increasingly important role in recent globalization, which stresses the massive movement of people. Many pilots and air-traffic controllers having a variety of Englishes, in terms of proficiency and local influence, share this communicative context. Proper use of phraseologic English is a crucial prerequisite for them to participate in the field. However, fatal accidents due to miscommunication where insufficient and improper English were contributing factors have still occurred. With particular focus on communication in air-traffic control (ATC), this paper reexamines some salient aviation accidents in order to critically analyze how communication breakdowns occurred and how various usages of Englishes account for them. It then introduces some attempts to avoid such communication breakdowns as well as analyzes limitations of those attempts. Finally, the paper proposes a few suggestions that may help aviation personnel to cooperatively achieve a better communicative context in aviation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many aviation accidents are caused by the failure of aircraft engine components, and engine blades are especially vulnerable to high-cycle fatigue fracture in severe working environments as well as to impact damage caused by foreign objects. To address this problem, the United States took the lead and has been successful in implementing laser shock peening (LSP) as a surface treatment for aircraft engine components to enhance their fatigue performance. This review provides an overview of the development of LSP for use in treating aircraft engine components over the past three decades, with a brief introduction to the development of high-energy pulsed lasers for LSP. A particular focus of this review is on the limitations and challenges associated with the application of LSP for treating critical aircraft engine components. It is hoped that this review serves as a reference for future research and development that can lead to better performance of these components. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The risk of catastrophic failures, for example in the aviation and aerospace industries, can be approached from different angles (e.g., statistics when they exist, or a detailed probabilistic analysis of the system). Each new accident carries information that has already been included in the experience base or constitutes new evidence that can be used to update a previous assessment of the risk. In this paper,we take a different approach and consider the risk and the updating from the investor's point of view. Based on the market response to past airplane accidents, we examine which ones have created a 'surpriseresponse' and which ones are considered part of the risk of the airline business as previously assessed. To do so, we quantify the magnitude and the timing of the observed market response to catastrophic accidents, and we compare it to an estimate of the response that would be expected based on the true actual cost of the accident including direct and indirect costs ('full-cost information' response). First, we develop a method based on stock market data to measure the actual market response to an accident and we construct an estimate of the 'full-cost information' response to such an event. We then compare the two figures for the immediate and the long-term response of the marketfor the affected firm, as well as for the whole industry group to which the firm belongs. As an illustration, we analyze a sample of ten fatal accidents experienced by major US domestic airlines during the last seven years. In four cases, we observed an abnormal market response. In these instances, it seems that the shareholders may have updated their estimates of the probability of a future accident in the affected airlines or more generally of the firm's future business prospects. This market reaction is not always easy to explain much less toanticipate, a fact which management should bear in mind when planning a firm's response to such an event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In aviation medicine until the early 1960s the idea that pilots would fly while under the influence of alcohol was taboo. In the United States of America, the taboo was broken when it became known that 30% of fatally injured pilots in general aviation had been under the influence of alcohol. Since then the rate has declined to 10%. No fatal accidents involving alcohol have been recorded in airline passenger transport. The prevalence of pilots flying under the influence of alcohol is unknown. The lowest studied blood alcohol concentration (BAC) with impaired flying skill today is 0.025%, effectively suggesting that the permitted level should be zero, but many aviation authorities have not yet translated such findings into rules and regulations. In the early 1970s the US Federal Air Surgeon began to re-issue licences for rehabilitated alcoholic pilots. Previously alcoholism had been a reason for mandatory permanent grounding. The possibility of returning to the cockpit first opened the way to early recognition of alcoholic pilots on a larger scale. Today many airlines have their own alcohol programmes. This paper gives a brief account of the Swissair programme with its four phases: observation, intervention, treatment and follow-up. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

United Airlines flight 232 crashed at Sioux City, Iowa, on July 19, 1989. The primary rescue workers were the men and women from the 185th Air National Guard Group. Because of the many deaths and massive destruction caused by the crash, a psychiatric consultation team was requested by the U.S. Air Force Surgeon General to assist the Air National Guard personnel. The consultation had four goals: (1) provide consultation to the Air National Guard on the mental health of the community; (2) provide direct psychiatric services on an acute basis and referral for follow-up care if necessary; (3) train mental health personnel as consultants following disasters; and (4) develop and implement a research plan that would address both the immediate and long-term health consequences of the rescue work. The consultation included community-oriented interventions directed toward reducing the effects of psychological stress on high-risk groups. This paper describes the consultations and the 1-year follow-up. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multisensor satellite data fusion merges measurements or products from imaging and sounding instruments with different spatial, spectral, and temporal resolution to obtain more comprehensive information about key atmospheric variables and processes. Here, data from low Earth and geostationary orbits, such as the Joint Polar Satellite Systems and Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites platforms, respectively, are integrated using spatial‐temporal fusion to enhance the detection of trace gas emissions from volcanoes. Not only does this yield trace gas information with improved spatial detail but, more importantly, the fusion product is also made available at significantly increased temporal resolution to help monitor the variable dispersion of trace gas emissions. The emission and dispersion of volcanic sulfur dioxide and ash plumes from the Cumbre Vieja volcano (Canary Islands, Spain) eruptions in October 2021 are studied through the synergistic exploitation of measurements and products from the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite, the Cross‐track Infrared Sounder, the TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument, and the Advanced Baseline Imager. Fusion results show increased spatial and temporal detail and describe evolution and directionality of the volcanic ash plumes; the potential benefits range from improved air quality monitoring to better guidance from aircraft safety systems. Plain Language Summary: Improved delineation of volcanic emissions is shown via fusion of the high spectral resolution sounder Cross‐track Infrared Sounder (CrIS) or TROPOspheric Monitoring instrument (TROPOMI), with Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite or Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) data. Whereas ABI is onboard geostationary satellite platforms, which offer fast temporal coverage, the other instruments are on low‐Earth orbit platforms providing twice daily global coverage instead. Sulfur dioxide (SO2) and ash from the Cumbre Vieja volcano eruptions on La Palma in the Canary Islands are tracked on two separate days in October 2021. While TROPOMI, since it measures in the visible and ultraviolet spectral ranges, is limited to daytime viewing, CrIS infrared measurements offer night and day coverage of SO2. Fusion with ABI enables the extension to time sequences of the changes in the emissions and the resulting plumes. This fusion demonstration foreshadows capabilities of planned future geostationary sensors. Key Points: Satellite Infrared Remote Sensing provides radiance data and imagery of the Earth's atmosphere during daytime and nighttimeMultisensor and multiplatform data fusion is applied to enhance spatial and temporal delineation of volcanic sulfur dioxide plumesFusing geostationary with polar‐orbiting satellite data assists monitoring volcanic eruptions to benefit aviation safety [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author reflects on the impact caused by the articles "Tesla Autopilot Crash: Tesla Autopilot Problem to Blame in Fatal Accident in China?" and "Google's Self-Driving Car May Have Caused First Crash." He discusses the need for utmost attention during the design, testing and use phase of these technical systems, the importance of analysis and mitigation of consequences of field accidents, and the need for new technology to be well understood and properly tested before releasing in the market.

The May 25th, 1979 Chicago DC-10 crash provides the opportunity to test an important proposition in the theory of consumer product safety: Can market forces provide safety when products are too complex to permit buyer prepurchase inspection? This paper combines economic theory with modern finance theory to measure the cost of the crash to shareholders of the plane's manufacturer, McDonnell Douglas. The results indicate that the DC-10 crash resulted in a $200 million loss to McDonnell Douglas stockholders and that this amount exceeds any reasonable estimate of regulatory or liability costs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing congestion in high altitude air routes has led to an expectation of large financial benefits from a reduction in separation standards, which will enable more aircraft to fly closer to their optimal altitude. The safety of reduced separation depends mainly on the reliability of aircraft height-keeping, which is itself the product of a number of different airframe, instrument and pilot-related errors. This is the subject of an international programme of studies under way in Europe, Japan and the United States. A review of studies being carried out in Europe is presented, indicating some of the problems encountered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transboundary crises, incidents, and disasters, such as chemical spills, airplane crashes, and critical infrastructure breakdowns, involving multiple levels and domains of governance pose a particular set of challenges (Ansell et al, 2010; Boin, 2019; Kuipers & Boin, 2015). These challenges also pertain to the investigation and learning phase of a crisis. We study a typical transboundary case: the crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17), with 298 people on board from a variety of nationalities but the majority from the Netherlands, that crashed in Ukraine in a conflict zone near the Russian border. The MH17 case contains valuable lessons on transboundary disaster investigations. The Dutch Safety Board (DSB) took the lead of the international independent investigation into the causes of the crash. With an international group of stakeholders, the DSB investigated a crash that resulted from a bilateral conflict, requiring the support from Ukraine's powerful neighbour Russia that meanwhile stood accused of withholding evidence and supporting Ukrainian separatists. Retrieving evidence and researching the causality of the crash was no easy task. If countries wish to follow their ambition to learn from accidents in order to "prevent the past repeated," they may more often need to investigate such transboundary cases. This case study probes into how challenges that are typical to transboundary crises affected the accident investigation into the MH17 disaster. We search for lessons on transboundary accident investigation that transcend the boundaries of this single case. Such lessons may prove invaluable for learning from future accidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines patterns of skeletal trauma in propeller‐driven aircraft crashes and blast‐related ground loss incidents from WWII. Specifically, descriptions and criteria used to characterize aircraft deceleration‐ versus blast‐related skeletal injuries are examined from 35 recently identified forensic anthropology cases to determine possible diagnostic traits and characterize skeletal trauma associated with these events. Among these cases, blast trauma is more localized within the skeleton and is associated with one or few primary directions of force. It is recommended that analysts differentiate between secondary and nonspecific blast trauma categories. Conversely, aircraft crash deceleration trauma is more widespread throughout the skeleton, with torsional fractures and injuries occurring from multiple or indeterminate directions. These traits reflect factors such as more complex loading environments than is seen in blast events. Two case studies are presented in detail to further illustrate differences in aircraft crash and blast‐related incidents. Both studies emphasize consideration of the body as a whole unit to facilitate interpretations. While the cases presented herein result from historic war‐related casualties that characterize the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency's (DPAA) casework, these skeletal cases provide guidelines more appropriate than clinically derived criteria developed through assessments of soft tissue injuries. These guidelines can be used by anthropologists and pathologists working with skeletal remain from mass disasters and other complex contexts, as well as provide avenues for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is an urgent need for more efficient and resilient infrastructure systems to support a growing population with increasingly scarce resources worldwide. As the demand for limited natural and man‐made resources grows, improved methods for resolving anticipated and unforeseen conflicts of availability are needed. System automation has broadly been adopted for efficiency optimization and resource deconfliction via preplanned actions and responses to anticipated needs. However, human intervention is still relied upon up to resolve emergent issues for which automation lacks the flexibility and adaptability to resolve. In this research, a context‐based decision model for system automation is presented that uses satisficing heuristics to deconflict shared resources without preplanning or human intervention. Via modeling and simulation, the presented model and existing rule‐based algorithms were applied to an air traffic management problem to compare performance with respect to: (a) system efficiency, (b) standard deviation of efficiency, and (c) system stability as a measure of disruption avoidance. Simulation results demonstrate that the presented model concurrently supports efficiency optimization and disruption avoidance for airspace deconfliction, averaging 9.7% higher system efficiency and a 1.5% lower standard deviation of efficiency than the existing rule‐based standard for aircraft collision avoidance (based on an air traffic density of 45 aircraft per 10 000 square nautical miles). The model presented here is extensible to engineered systems that rely on shared, finite resources for mission execution. This research is relevant to the domains of critical infrastructure management, risk management, distributed control systems, and mission assurance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transboundary crises, incidents and disasters, such as chemical spills, airplane crashes and critical infrastructure breakdowns, involving multiple levels and domains of governance pose a particular set of challenges. These challenges also pertain to the investigation and learning phase of a crisis. We study a typical transboundary case: the crash of a Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17), with 298 people on board from a variety of nationalities but the majority from the Netherlands, that crashed in Ukraine in a conflict zone near the Russian border. The MH17 case contains valuable lessons on transboundary disaster investigations. The Dutch Safety Board (DSB) took the lead of the international independent investigation into the causes of the crash. With an international group of stakeholders, the DSB investigated a crash that resulted from a bilateral conflict, requiring the support from Ukraine's powerful neighbour Russia that meanwhile stood accused of withholding evidence and supporting Ukrainian separatists. Retrieving evidence and researching the causality of the crash was no easy task. If countries wish to follow their ambition to learn from accidents in order to "prevent the past repeated," they may more often need to investigate such transboundary cases. This case study probes into how challenges that are typical to transboundary crises affected the accident investigation into the MH17 disaster. We search for lessons on transboundary accident investigation that transcend the boundaries of this single case. Such lessons may prove invaluable for learning from future accidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An accident occurred when an aircraft landed at Narita International Airport, Japan, on 20 June 2012. The aircraft encountered rapid changes of winds together with strong turbulence, although the weather was fair. In the present study, a two‐domain nested regional weather prediction models are used. The results in the outer domain show that southwesterly winds associated with a synoptic extratropical cyclone were locally accelerated to the southwest of the airport resulting in strong vertical shear. The simulation in the inner domain reproduces horizontal convective rolls, which are similar to those observed by a Doppler lidar at the airport. The wind velocity component parallel to the runway had a spatial variation of about 10 m s −1. The present approach using a large eddy simulation is useful for clarifying environments and features of horizontal convective rolls and forecasting low‐level wind shear associated with them, which can be a significant risk for aircraft. Plain Language Summary: Synoptic/mesoscale fronts and downbursts (strong downdrafts from a thunderstorm and diverging winds after they hit the ground) are known to be serious threats to airplanes during takeoff and landing. However, it is less known that there is another type of danger under fair weather conditions. An aircraft landing at Narita International Airport, Japan, in the afternoon of 20 June 2012 encountered rapid changes of wind and turbulence and made a hard landing, resulting in several injuries and damage to the fuselage. A Doppler lidar, a remote sensing device for monitoring low‐level winds at the airport observed alternating regions of strong and weak winds aligned southwest–northeast, perpendicular to the runway. In order to clarify the detailed structure and mechanism of these disturbances, numerical simulations using a fine‐resolution (horizontal resolution: 100 m) nested in a coarse resolution (horizontal resolution: 1 km) are made. The simulations show that horizontal convective rolls, which occur in convective boundary layers with strong vertical shear (vertical gradient of horizontal wind speed) were prevailing. These rolls are associated with the rapid changes in wind speed and turbulence similar to those observed by the Doppler lidar and flight recorder. The present study demonstrates that the large eddy simulation is useful for clarifying the structure and mechanisms of horizontal convective rolls, which caused the aircraft accident, and also for forecasting them. Key Points: Horizontal convective rolls that caused an aircraft accident in a fair weather condition were successfully reproduced by a numerical modelCharacteristics of the rolls and turbulence as observed by a Doppler lidar and flight recorder are clarified based on the model resultsCapability of accessing and operationally predicting potentially hazardous rolls by use of a large eddy simulation is demonstrated [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People can experience disasters vicariously (indirectly) via conversation, social media, radio, and television, even when not directly involved in a disaster. This study examined whether vicarious exposure to the MH17‐airplane crash in Ukraine, with 196 Dutch victims, elicited affective and somatic responses in Dutch adults about 2,600 km away, who happened to participate in an ongoing diary study. Participants (n = 141) filled out a diary three times a day for 30 days on their smartphones. Within‐person changes in positive affect (PA) and negative affect (NA) and somatic symptoms after the crash were studied. Additionally, we tested whether between‐person differences in response could be explained by age, baseline personality (NEO‐FFI‐3), and media exposure. The MH17 crash elicited a small within‐person decrease in PA and an increase in NA and somatic symptoms. This response waned after 3 days and returned to baseline at day four. The decrease in PA was larger in more extraverted participants but smaller in those higher on neuroticism or conscientiousness. The NA response was smaller in elderly. Personality did not seem to moderate the NA and somatic response, and neither did media exposure. Dutch participants showed small acute somatic and affective responses up till 3 days to a disaster that they had not directly witnessed. Vicariously experienced disasters can thus elicit affective‐visceral responses indicative of acute stress reactions. Personality and age explained some of the individual differences in this reaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the call of Christian Folly-Kassi, Secretary-General of the African Airlines Association (AFRAA), that African states must improve their aviation safety. AFRAA has organized a two-day air disaster management training aimed at preparing various African airlines on emergency responses to air crashes. According to Vinod Chidambaram, African regional vice-president, the biggest problem facing Africa's aviation industry is the lack of regulation in many countries. It also states that the lack of equipment and technology are also to blame.

The article reports on the crash of a Congolese domestic airliner. It is said that more than 70 people were killed when a Congolese domestic airliner taking off from the eastern city of Goma crashed into a crowded market district and caught fire. It is also said that at least six people on board survived the crash of the Hewa Bora Airways passenger jet in Goma. It is further stated that more than 45 people were injured in the crash, the latest aviation disaster to hit the vast central African state which has one of the world's worst air safety records.

In this article, we examine the relationship between safety culture and national culture, and the implications of this relationship for international safety culture assessments. Focussing on Hofstede's uncertainty avoidance ( UA) index, a survey study of 13,616 Air Traffic Management employees in 21 European countries found a negative association between safety culture and national norm data for UA. This is theorized to reflect the influence of national tendencies for UA upon attitudes and practices for managing safety (e.g., anxiety on risk; reliance on protocols; concerns over reporting incidents; openness to different perspectives). The relationship between UA and safety culture is likely to have implications for international safety culture assessments. Specifically, benchmarking exercises will consistently indicate safety management within organizations in high UA countries to be poorer than low UA countries due to the influence of national culture upon safety practices, which may limit opportunities for identifying and sharing best practice. We propose the use of safety culture against international group norms ( SIGN) scores to statistically adjust for the influence of UA upon safety culture data, and to support the identification of safety practices effective and particular to low or high UA cultures. Practitioner points National cultural tendencies for uncertainty avoidance (UA) are negatively associated with safety culture., This indicates that employee safety-related attitudes and practices may be influenced by national culture, and thus factors outside the direct control of organizational management., International safety culture assessments should attempt to determine the influence of national culture upon safety culture in order that benchmarking exercises compare aspects of safety management and not national culture., Safety culture against international group norms (SIGN) scores provide a potential way to do this, and can facilitate the identification of best practice within countries operating in a low or high UA cultural cluster. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Collisions between birds and aircraft cause billions of dollars of damages annually to civil, commercial, and military aviation. Yet technology to reduce bird strike is not generally effective, especially over longer time periods. Previous information from our lab indicated that filling an area with acoustic noise, which masks important communication channels for birds, can displace European Starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) from food sources. Here we deployed a spatially controlled noise (termed a "sonic net"), designed to overlap with the frequency range of bird vocalizations, at an airfield. By conducting point counts, we monitored the presence of birds for four weeks before deployment of our sonic net, and for four weeks during deployment. We found an 82% reduction in bird presence in the sonic net area compared with change in the reference areas. This effect was as strong in the fourth week of exposure as in the first week. We also calculated the potential costs avoided resulting from this exclusion. We propose that spatially controlled acoustic manipulations that mask auditory communication for birds may be an effective long term and fairly benign way of excluding problem birds from areas of socioeconomic importance, such as airfields, agricultural sites, and commercial properties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

German foreign policy did adapt its principled beliefs as far as German‐Russian relationship is concerned and was successful in integrating EU and NATO over the crisis, but did not manage to adapt decisively causal beliefs at the tactical level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most critical challenges to full integration of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) into the National Airspace System (NAS) is the requirement to comply with CFR 14 Part 91.113 to 'see and avoid' other aircraft. Various attempts have been made to develop systems to 'sense and avoid' other aircraft so UAS can comply with the intent of the regulation. This article proposes a framework to develop effectiveness requirements for any SAA system by linking UAS characteristics and operating environments to midair collision risk quantified by a fatality rate. The framework consists of a target level of safety (TLS) approach using an event tree format. Safety has been identified as the most important consideration in the UAS integration process. While safety can be defined in many ways, the authors propose using a fatality rate metric that follows other statistics used in the industry. This metric allows for the use of a TLS approach to the development of SAA requirements for system certification. Failure to adequately link system requirements to safety could result in the implementation of SAA systems that either do not adequately mitigate the risk associated with UAS operations or are overdesigned, resulting in increased cost and complexity. This article demonstrates the use of the proposed framework to develop specific SAA effectiveness standards based on UAS weight and airspace class combinations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers military news briefs of Egypt as of September 1-30, 2014 on topics including plane crash of Egyptian military aircraft and purchase of military equipment and arms from Russia.

Flying robots that can locomote efficiently in GPS-denied cluttered environments have many applications, such as in search and rescue scenarios. However, dealing with the high amount of obstacles inherent to such environments is a major challenge for flying vehicles. Conventional flying platforms cannot afford to collide with obstacles, as the disturbance from the impact may provoke a crash to the ground, especially when friction forces generate torques affecting the attitude of the platform. We propose a concept of resilient flying robots capable of colliding into obstacles without compromising their flight stability. Such platforms present great advantages over existing robots as they are capable of robust flight in cluttered environments without the need for complex sense and avoid strategies or three-dimensional mapping of the environment. We propose a design comprising an inner frame equipped with conventional propulsion and stabilization systems enclosed in a protective cage that can rotate passively thanks to a three-axis gimbal system, which reduces the impact of friction forces on the attitude of the inner frame. After addressing important design considerations thanks to a collision model and validation experiments, we present a proof-of-concept platform, named GimBall, capable of flying in various cluttered environments. Field experiments demonstrate the robot's ability to fly fully autonomously through a forest while experiencing multiple collisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information related to International Association of Geomorphologists/Association Internationale des Géomorphologues (IAG/AIG). Topics include the 8th International Conference on Geomorphology in Paris, France from August 27-31, 2013, the death of Bojan Erhartič, a doctor and geographer, due to plane accident, and the BSG Post-graduate Training Workshop to be held in Windsor, Great Britain from December 9-12, 2013.

SUMMARY A worldwide accident survey of manned and unmanned aircraft shows in-flight loss of control remains a major contributor to aircraft accidents. Operation outside the normal fight envelope is usually subject to failure of components, inappropriate crew response, and environmental conditions. The aerodynamic model of aircraft associated with hazardous weather and abnormal conditions is inherently nonlinear and unsteady. A novel adaptive nonlinear model predictive controller is proposed and conceptually proven to ensure safe control of the Meridian unmanned aerial system in off-nominal conditions. Nonlinear model predictive controllers are capable of handling input and output constraints that directly satisfy safety and performance requirements in off-nominal conditions. The performance of a nonlinear model predictive controller relies heavily on the physics-based model. Controller performance is improved by updating the physics-based model by using real-time nonlinear estimation of aerodynamic forces. Real-time nonlinear estimation of aerodynamic forces is obtained utilizing artificial neural networks with time-varying adaptive parameters. The adaptive nonlinear model predictive controller, coupled with real-time parameter identification, is shown to exhibit robust characteristics and to successfully mitigate the impact of nonlinear and unsteady aerodynamics while preventing loss of control. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the imperative to make the skies of Africa safer. It is said that Africa's air accident rate has prompted the governments to act free up air travel. It is stated that the air sector in the world's poorest continent is lagging badly in its freight and passenger traffic as the global aviation industry heads for turbulence in 2008. It is further said that improvements in training, technology, and infrastructure could make a difference and an urge to African governments to act to improve safety standards was made.

While flying remains one of the safest means of travel, reported birdstrikes on aircraft have risen. This is a result of increased aircraft flight movements, changes in agricultural methods and greater environmental awareness contributing to growing populations of hazardous bird species, as well as more diligent reporting of incidents. Measures to mitigate this hazard require accurate data about the species involved; however, the remains of birds from these incidents are often not easy to identify. Reported birdstrikes include a substantial number where the species cannot be determined from morphology alone. DNA barcoding offers a reliable method of identifying species from very small amounts of organic material such as blood, muscle and feathers. We compare species identification based on morphological criteria and identifications based on mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I DNA barcoding methods for New Zealand species. Our data suggest that DNA-based identification can substantially add to the accuracy of species identifications, and these methods represent an important addition to existing procedures to improve air safety. In addition, we outline simple and effective protocols for the recovery and processing of samples for DNA barcoding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During aviation accident investigations, vitreous fluid and urine samples from pilot fatalities are analyzed for glucose and blood for hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) to monitor diabetic pilots and to discover other pilots with undiagnosed/unreported diabetes. The prevalence of elevated glucose concentrations in fatally injured pilots was evaluated by searching the Civil Aerospace Medical Institute’s Toxicology Database for the period 1998–2005. Out of 1335 pilots involving 363 vitreous fluid, 365 urine, and 607 vitreous fluid and urine analyses, 43 pilots had elevated glucose in vitreous fluid (>125 mg/dL) and/or in urine (>100 mg/dL). Of the 20 pilots whose blood samples were analyzed, nine had >6% HbA1c—four were known diabetics, and five were unknown diabetics. Urinary glucose levels were elevated in all 13 known hyperglycemic pilots. A considerable number of pilots (30 of 43) had elevated glucose and HbA1c (5 of 20), suggesting undiagnosed/unreported diabetic conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bat collisions are a threat to commercial and military aircraft in Australia. We examined bat strike records from Australia during 1996-2006 and found that risk of impact from bats is increasing, is greatest in tropical versus temperate regions, and is more likely during early evening and while an aircraft is landing rather than departing. Temporal patterns of bat strikes differ from those of birds, highlighting the need to employ taxon-specific management strategies to minimize animal impacts on the aviation industry. The use of genetics for identification of strike remains and the implementation of nocturnal survey techniques by wildlife managers at airports will contribute to the mitigation of bat strikes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three experiments examined the role of story structure in memory for written aviation accident reports by both pilots and nonpilots. Accident reports follow a standard format providing setting, complication, decision and outcome information. Following the ‘predictive features’ model, it was hypothesized that expertise would facilitate recall, and that pilots would recall most effectively with the complication feature. Pilot and nonpilot participants read and recalled 4 (Experiment 1) or 8 (Experiment 2) accident reports. With four cases, pilots recalled more than nonpilots, but no difference was found with eight cases. A primacy effect for pattern of recall was found in Experiment 1 with the setting and complication features most effective in triggering case recall. When task difficulty was increased (Experiment 2), the complication feature alone was the most effective. In Experiment 3, we manipulated text structure and found that complication and decision features were better recognized than setting or outcome features by nonpilots. The finding across three studies that the complication feature was consistently the most effective for retrieving aviation accident reports supports the ‘predictive features’ model. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]