Dr. Andrew Neal - Sky High Research
Psychologist Dr Andrew Neal will use his award to develop a computer program aimed at maintaining Australia's high air-safety standards.The software uses data such as traffic volume and complexity to predict the average time an air traffic controller needs to identify and avert potential conflict between aircraft.
Potential uses include workload assessment and prediction management by airspace management systems world-wide and assessment of safety issues associated with 'free flight', a proposal by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (www.icao.int/icao/en/jr/5203_ar.htm).
Dr Neal, a senior lecturer in the University's Key Centre for Human Factors and School of Psychology, is one of a team of University psychologists and computer scientists working with scientists from Defence Research and Development Canada.
He said controllers worked from computer screens showing aircraft in assigned sectors, monitoring and directing traffic to maintain a safe, orderly and efficient flow.
This included observing separation standards requiring aircraft to maintain minimum vertical and horizontal distances from each other.
'Our program will predict the average time that air traffic controllers will take to identify conflict, i.e. breaches of separation standards,' he said. 'This will help in making judgments on the number of aircraft a controller can safely handle at one time.'
