FTE and Pilot Workload Comparison of Perspective Flight Guidance Displays to Conventional Flight Director Symbology in Instrument Approach Applications 2001-01-2992

Current requirements for precision air navigation are no longer in nautical miles, but tenths of miles as reflected in the RNP3 (Required Navigation Performance) or Required Navigation Performance (desired flight path) of .3 NM (± .n nmi).

Flight director guidance for critical maneuvers (those maneuvers with very small or reduced margins for error) is essential for precision navigation requirements. Current generations of guidance symbology (Delta-Veebar and Two-bar) work well, but are limited in their ability to display future flight path information to the pilot and/or the results of pilot control input. Both display symbology sets are designed to follow command guidance from an off-course situation to return to a nominal (null error) solution, known as a compensatory tracking task.

As stated in O’Hare, D, & Roscoe, S., 1990, increasingly such displays cause much “mental gymnastics” cognitive processing and pilot mental workload, often leading to additional error and total loss of situational control, resulting in full scale deflection, that is, maximum deviation mandating a missed approach.

In order to reduce tracking errors and pilot workload, one must provide the pilot with increased situational awareness of the aircraft’s relation to the desired flight path, the flight path itself or track, and the actual aircraft performance (flight path vector) as well as the desired/commanded and predicted aircraft performance.

The use of a perspective flight guidance displays with a predictive flight path/performance symbology set provides that increased situational awareness.

Flight path vector-based (FPV) Perspective Flightpath Guidance (PFG) provides pilots with an intuitive symbology set which enables the execution of steep precision instrument approaches using a high resolution 2D or 3D-like database in near zero visibility. PFG technology utilizes differential GPS (dGPS) for precision waypoint geolocation, combined with a “quickened” predictive flight-path-vector and “tunnel-in-the-sky” pathway guidance to develop an affordable, intuitive, rotorcraft/tiltrotor instrument approach guidance symbology system. Effectively designed and implemented, PFG is capable of replacing traditional, workload-intensive, Two-bar and Delta-Veebar flight director terminal approach guidance while providing smaller flight technical error and reduced plot workload.