Hejar Gürlük

Concept of an adaptive augmented vision based assistance system for air traffic control towers

This paper introduces a novel concept towards future tower air traffic control operations in order to tackle the known “head-down vs. head-up problem”. A possible solution to the mentioned problem could be an augmented-vision based assistance system projecting air traffic data into the real outside view of the tower controller. However, there are also technical limitations and unsolved ergonomic issues regarding untailored information presentation, over-cluttering, ambiguous display symbology, latency, non-collimated view etc. This paper will present the conceptual framework for an envisioned assistance system for air traffic control towers that fuses adaptive information management with augmented vision. The concept constitutes the fundament of the future prototype development. Based on a multidimensional adaptive automation model which is described in this paper, the assistance system monitors both the operational environment and the ATCO behaviour. The assistance system then adapts its information content and mode of interaction accordingly following the premise to display the right (amount of) information at the right time. The paper will also illustrate the first conceptual designs that were presented to several active ATCOs and their feedback to it. The proposed system architecture for a wearable head-up display for the tower environment and the potential benefits and challenges of the envisioned assistance system will be described as well. The paper concludes with on-going activities and necessary steps for future work.

Research Design to Access the Mental Workload of Air Traffic Controllers

The German Federal Institute of Occupational Safety and Health in Berlin developed a method for neuronal mental workload monitoring. The so-called Dual Frequency Head Maps (DFHM) method allows defining the workload range of each person individually. The current research project describes the evaluation and condition-related verification of the DFHM method in a simulated realistic environment of an air traffic control center. During an interactive real-time simulation at the Air Traffic Validation Center of the German Aerospace Center, the load level for the controllers was varied by means of two independent variables: the traffic demand and the occurrence of a priority request. Dependent variables for registering mental workload were the DFHM index, heart rate, subjective questionnaires, and air traffic performance data.

Migration tolerant human computer interaction for air traffic controllers

Human machine interfaces (HMI) in the product division of air traffic management (ATM) are in use for long time spans. For an efficient use of HMIs not only user centered but also migration tolerant designs are important. Migration tolerance therefore means considering future requirements for a long lasting controller HMI life cycle. For efficient ATM, the concept of system wide information management (SWIM) will be introduced. This generates a large amount of additional information that will influence controller work. In this paper, we therefore describe a new controller role called Information-and-Conflict-Manager (ICM) who handles the complexity induced by SWIM. The resulting HMI design draft demonstrates how the integration of data could be managed. ICM also supervises training to support controllers successfully passing future flight guidance transitions.