Influence of Icing Information on Pilot Strategies for Operating in Icing Conditions

Theine uenceofpotential remoteice-detectionsystem featuresonpilotdecision makingwasinvestigated through a Web-based experiment. Display features including a graphical plan view depiction of icing severity, vertical view depiction, single and multiple icing severity levels as well as sensor range were varied in a part-task simulation experiment. Using information from each display, pilots were presented with a set of four e ight scenarios and probed on theirrouting decisions and comfort level with thosedecisions. Theexperimentalso included a subjective display preference evaluation. Results show that all of the displays improved pilot decision making over existing text-based icing information. The three-dimensional displays that included vertical depiction of icing conditions were found to support improved decision making. Range was not found to be a strong factor in the experiment; however, the minimum range tested was 25 n miles, which may be in excess of current technical capabilities. The depictionoftheseverity oficingconditionswasnotfoundto beasimportantasaccurateinformation on thelocation of icing conditions.