Mission Accomplished for AFRL's Joint Cockpit Office

  • Published
  • By John Schutte
  • Human Effectiveness Directorate
WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio --  The Air Force Research Laboratory's Joint Cockpit Office (JCO) is expected to close this summer, having served for more than 12 years as a watchdog and advocate at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base for standardized military aircraft cockpit technology and symbology. 

The office was chartered in 1994 to help prevent overlapping research efforts by the Air Force, Navy and Army and to serve as a focal point for Air Force cockpit-centered research prior to consolidation of the Air Force labs into a single AFRL in 1997. An exchange officer from the British Royal Air Force (RAF) has been assigned to the JCO since its inception. 

"I think the keystone was to put the RAF exchange officer in there to reinforce the joint nature of the office," said Squadron Leader James S. Phillips, the RAF representative for the past two and a half years. 

The Flight Symbology Development Group, a major portion of the JCO's mission, is expected to continue operations in another Air Force venue, Phillips said, but those plans are not yet solid. Through an approval or endorsement program, the flight symbology group ensures that new cockpit designs and modifications to existing cockpits use symbols and devices that meet the current military standard for aircraft display symbology. 

Phillips, who is assigned to AFRL's Warfighter Interface Division, System Control Interfaces Branch (HECI), says the JCO played a vital role in standardizing aircraft cockpit design and improving flight safety, but it has outlived the responsibilities of its planned six-year lifetime. 

"We've closed the office because its job is done," Phillips said. "The primary success of this office is that cockpits of today are not as diverse as they were 15 years ago. Had we not been here I think you'd have seen a lot more variations in designs, and we stopped that at the right time." 

First Lt. Clifford C. Combs, a human interface engineer with AFRL/HECI who shares with Phillips the distinction of being one of the final JCO officers, said the JCO worked to maintain standard positioning of primary flight references in the cockpit, which directly improved aircrew safety. 

"We're walking that line between what is sensible and what is operationally necessary," Phillips explained. "We made designers aware that humans need to see things a certain way, especially after training that way and expecting to see it that way." 

The JCO also provided a program manager for AFRL's Spatial Disorientation Countermeasures Program, which linked strands of research that previously were not connected, Phillips said. For example, under that program three-dimensional audio was introduced to the dynamic environment simulator (DES), helping researchers improve their fundamental knowledge of spatial disorientation and better understand how to prevent and overcome its effects. 

Phillips, a 25-year RAF veteran, is coincidentally scheduled to return to Britain in July, about the same time the JCO's phase-out will be complete. He is one of 53 RAF officers, including four others at Wright-Patterson, who are currently assigned to the Air Force under an exchange program initiated by Winston Churchill in 1941. 

At the height of its activity in the 1990s, the JCO was home to 10 officers responsible for reviewing cockpit symbology designs with an eye toward commonality among aircraft platforms. The office also supported joint acquisition programs such as the F-22 and the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and maintained and upgraded the Air Force written standard for flight symbology. 

Flight symbology refers to the cockpit indicators or gauges for those elements required to fly an aircraft, including attitude, altitude, airspeed, horizon reference, vertical velocity and heading.
 
Phillips is proud of the fact that other Air Force organizations have noticed the value of JCO's efforts. The Aeronautical Systems Command (ASC) is developing an initiative for overall cockpit commonality, applying JCO's process to cockpit hardware and tactical symbology. 

"Our success is that we've demonstrated that you can encourage a more common aspect to design," Phillips said. "We're not trying to impose identical symbology on all aircraft types; we're just trying to hone it down so the diversity is kept under control." 

The JCO also has endorsed head-up displays (HUD) and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) symbology and influenced the C-141 glass cockpit and the Predator ground control station designs. The office is currently coordinating programs for the B-1 bomber, C-12 cargo aircraft, F-15, F-16 and F-35 fighters and the T-38 trainer.