Cockpit Pilot Warning System: A Preliminary Study

Human factor represents one of the leading causes of aircraft accidents. Fatigue is one of the most critical human factor elements which plays an important role particularly in commercial aviation, such the case of long haul flights. A concept design for a Cockpit Pilot Warning System - CPWS capable of detecting increasing level of pilot workload using pilots' physiological data is presented in this paper. The proposed system development is based on a multidisciplinary design approach that will integrate human factors and ergonomics knowledge, human physiological behaviour, digital signal and image processing techniques. Preliminary results about pilots' physiological signal acquired during simulated flights are presented in this paper in comparison with standard workload subjective analysis.