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E, F and G grounded
- Thread starter EODDave
- Start date
For those who miss their chamber experience, The FAA runs a chamber and the masks in Oklahoma, for free. Certain civilian jobs that require chamber flights will send their people there, but it's also open to the general aviation public as well. When I went I met a bunch of individuals from Cessna as one guy from FedEx's corporate side of the house.
In the USMC, especially 2 seat squadrons, it always seemed to be a "select it on climbout if you need to, write it up after, maintenance will get to it in a week or so" kind of mode. I actually had a senior maintenance controller tell me once as a new pilot "Sir, we don't like to open up the ECS system too often. You never know what kind of problems you might find."
I think our community is too confident in the ROBD's capabilities. It only gives you symptoms for 1 very specific type of hypoxia (hypoxic hypoxia). Your real life symptoms may be different because they could be histotoxic hypoxia. Also, doing it on the ghetto Microsoft flight simulator instead of the real simulator so you can get people through faster cheapens the training. Finally, most of the people assisting don't force guys to complete the whole EP, all the way to descending below 10k, opening ram dump, finishing the bottle, then removing the mask. Personally, I think the procedure should be bold face all the way to removing the mask. In recent history very few have done the EP correctly that far.
There really isn't any way that I know of to simulate histotoxic hypoxia. Exposure to substances that induce histotoxic hypoxia in concentrations sufficient to induce symptoms isn't something I would want to do outside an ICU setting. I don't know of any substance that could be given to simulate histotoxic hypoxia that would be reversible in any reasonable time frame either.
The initial vision for the ROBD was to piggyback the device onto the available full-motion sims, which is actually where one of the first device demos was done. It doesn't sound like what really happened. Had that been incorporated, I think that would have directly addressed the concerns that Pourts makes about the device. Having the device in the sim would also permit logging the flight data for the pilot to view after the "flight". The connection could be made between performance degradation in advance of symptoms, and the difficulty in maintaining safe flight while hypoxic and trying to complete the EP for hypoxia. I'm a bit disappointed that the training wasn't deployed as envisioned. I understand the need for throughput, but in my mind, the real value of the ROBD was in inducing hypoxemia not by playing patty-cake in a box with 20 of your closest friends, but rather in a setting as close as possible to the actual flight environment, with all the distractions that could impair recognition of a potentially fatal event.
R/
The initial vision for the ROBD was to piggyback the device onto the available full-motion sims, which is actually where one of the first device demos was done. It doesn't sound like what really happened. Had that been incorporated, I think that would have directly addressed the concerns that Pourts makes about the device. Having the device in the sim would also permit logging the flight data for the pilot to view after the "flight". The connection could be made between performance degradation in advance of symptoms, and the difficulty in maintaining safe flight while hypoxic and trying to complete the EP for hypoxia. I'm a bit disappointed that the training wasn't deployed as envisioned. I understand the need for throughput, but in my mind, the real value of the ROBD was in inducing hypoxemia not by playing patty-cake in a box with 20 of your closest friends, but rather in a setting as close as possible to the actual flight environment, with all the distractions that could impair recognition of a potentially fatal event.
R/
Did they shut down the chamber at Pensacola?
That's how I did it at -106 in the 2012-2013 timeframe. Some guys even did it with the sims linked up- practicing talking to/flying with a wingman with a hypoxic event... Maybe this was just an evaluation of procedures for implementation?
Unless I'm mistaken, your symptoms could differ for any number of reasons, which is my main issue with ROBD - I think it potentially produces a false sense of confidence in one's ability to rule out hypoxia (i.e., "I feel funny but this isn't what ROBD did to me so I probably don't need to pull the green ring").
Sounds like you know a lot about it. Is it true that Zeus, the structures instructor at the ASO course designed the device and has the patent?
That is true. The symptoms of hypoxia aren't that specific to that particular physiologic condition. However, in the right setting, ANY symptoms similar to those induced by hypoxia should probably be treated as hypoxia until proven otherwise.
Not sure about the call sign, but it could be him. There were several people on the patent, and one of them was an civilian mechanical engineer at NAMRL. He may have stayed in the area when NAMRL shut down. The original proof-of-concept device and at least one improved version were built at NAMRL in Pensacola before they went out for contract assembly.
R/
Bottom line, if there's any doubt, there is no doubt. Use the green ring, secure OBOGS, and descend.
I once had what turned out to be a dehydrated WSO report feeling "funny" on a summer low altitude flight. He pulled the green ring. I felt 100% fine, but also I pulled mine. Better safe than sorry. OTOH, at least a couple of hazreps I've read show aircrew reporting recognized hypoxia symptoms based on ROBD training, so I think it's fair to say despite its drawbacks, it's still a step up from patty-cake in the chamber.
I once had what turned out to be a dehydrated WSO report feeling "funny" on a summer low altitude flight. He pulled the green ring. I felt 100% fine, but also I pulled mine. Better safe than sorry. OTOH, at least a couple of hazreps I've read show aircrew reporting recognized hypoxia symptoms based on ROBD training, so I think it's fair to say despite its drawbacks, it's still a step up from patty-cake in the chamber.
You guys live this way more than I have, but I wouldn't completely discount the patty-cake chamber, either. I've gone through the chamber twice and also had two episodes of recognized hypoxia after each ride (w/in a year, respectively). The symptoms I felt in the chamber (which ironically, were no symptoms until mental "lameness") were the same thing I had in the aircraft. Since I didn't have much to go on for such a relatively long time in the aircraft, I greatly appreciated the chamber ride for showing me specifically what would happen to me.
Gotta ask, what altitudes were you at? I've only been up to 10k in the 60. I know a few guys who did high altitude testing in it, but that's it... Super curious now.
Both the chamber and the ROBD experiences are physiologically similar, but the ROBD teaches to a slightly different end than the hypoxia chamber. In the chamber, everybody knows what's coming, and the environment is very "stimulating", which tends to mask some of the subtle early symptoms and performance impairments of hypoxia. With the ROBD, one could conduct a scenario in the sim where the workload isn't that high, and the aircrew could get a different take on hypoxia.
In the chamber, the mask is your friend. When something goes wrong with OBOGS, that might not always be the case, which is where the ROBD has a role, in my opinion. The ROBD certainly has its limitations (no sense of pressure change, maybe some inconsistency on how the training is presented), but I think it is a useful adjunct to the chamber. If more people can get exposed to the signs and symptoms of hypoxia, that's all good. If one Class A is avoided, the program pays for itself just about forever.
R/
In the chamber, the mask is your friend. When something goes wrong with OBOGS, that might not always be the case, which is where the ROBD has a role, in my opinion. The ROBD certainly has its limitations (no sense of pressure change, maybe some inconsistency on how the training is presented), but I think it is a useful adjunct to the chamber. If more people can get exposed to the signs and symptoms of hypoxia, that's all good. If one Class A is avoided, the program pays for itself just about forever.
R/
There's strong evidence that the programs (ROBD and chamber both) has already done so more than once. I wasn't trying to malign the chamber in itself. However, the periodic nature of ROBD training has much to recommend it over the "lifetime" qual of the chamber. That, the reduced risk of DCS, and even the lower cost and easy set-up of ROBD make it desirable IMHO.
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