DLR Project NICo – Feasibility Study of an Alternate Airport Assistant for Pilots Deciding Where to Divert

Abstract

Recently, industry has worked on concepts for reducing active flight crew in cruise while one crew member is resting (extended Minimum Crew Operations, eMCO). The project Next generation Intelligent Cockpit (NICo) of the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) aimed to develop assistance systems in the context of single pilot operations (SiPO) to support and relieve pilots in phases of high workload. To assist pilots with considering options for an alternate airport in case of urgent diversions, DLR has designed an electronic flight bag (EFB) application that calculates in-flight and landing performance and provides a ranking of suitable airports. Four criteria comprising distance, fuel on arrival, stop margin and crosswind defined suitability. In a previous pilot survey, these criteria were identified as important when deciding where to divert. The aims of a simulator study were to assess the functionalities of the EFB application and to gain pilot feedback on its usability and suggestions for further development. Focus was laid on investigating whether the equal weightings are consistent with the pilots’ reasoning. Seven crews of two pilots with current or past Airbus A320 type rating performed a scenario in the DLR AVES full-motion A320 simulator. In this study, crews had to decide whether they would divert to an alternate airport when encountering a non-time-critical malfunction in adverse meteorological conditions. The pilots made use of the EFB application during their FORDEC process resting importance on its comprehensible ranking mechanism. In a preliminary analysis of results, it became evident that pilots rated the EFB application favourably and would consider using it in real operations when faced with the need to divert from the planned destination. Pilots experienced little workload throughout the scenario which shows that the EFB application is intuitive, helpful and lowers the workload in a potentially stressful situation.