Hi Machinbird,
Since microsleep events occur without warning, and are generally not recognized by the participant as a sleep event, the best method of detecting one is by detecting the resulting confusion that results from loss of the plan. This is the news that I hope you can use.
In the process of writing this report, I found an excellent paper published by the NZ CAA:
http://www.caa.govt.nz/Publications/...un03Vector.pdf
Very interesting report. It brings an answer to FREDAcheck : EVERYBODY may have microsleep. It is not a disease in se.
As we all are living with the discontinuity of being asleep or awoken around two times a day our brains have a "chaotic" dynamic : so we can never make it SURE to work this way or that way. Chaos is a math model of morphogenesis, and include notably ALL the systems where function or any derivates is not continue, i.e. asleep/awake, living/being dead, being a foetus or being born, and also any complex continuous system like fluid mechanic, life, communication, economy, aso. But also simpler system who are not linear like the movement of planets around the sun, etc.
We cannot preview the evolution of a chaotic system. This one is very sensible to a very small event .
Machinbird you told us your recent event but tomorrow it may happen to FREDAcheck and there is no trial risk to break a taboo.
Searchers studied micro sleeps and sleep inertia only on initialy well-rested persons and are far away to know everything about sleep, a fortiori about microsleeps. It is time to break the silence about fatigue.
Many pilots have experienced excessive fatigue, for instance when you have to divert with passengers or freight due to sudden fog, and going into the hotel to "rest" you are watching meteo from hour to hour until you reach conditions for take-off. Many pilots here wrote they are very tired at landing during normal flight. I remember that "rest" in Maastricht some hours between landing and take-off as freightdog : We were laying on non level hard armchairs with lights in the eyes in any direction, trying to find a rest position. Sometimes we prefered to go to the night bar where we had good chairs to sit, one of us was grounded one week after the barman told the French DGAC he drunk one glass of beer. At the same times we did not know how much fuel we had actualy, we had three different numbers and no flight manual of that aircraft done with parts of aircrafts destroyed in the bush anywhere in the world. The aircraft was said to be a A27-DHC6, had enforced leading edges at the wing roots but engines were 2x600 HP like the A20... Glycol flowed on the electronic boxes producting a mixed vapour and odour of glycol and ozone because the windshield anti-ice was connected to nothing, but everyday they filled it again. Often some instrument didn't like glycol and failed during the flight. Be sure, FREDAcheck that insurances would have payed without trial to search if we were microsleeping in the vapours... A colleague told he was eating pills to sleep before they came back from Tokyo to overcome his jetlag. During night flights we often could see every crew had to resist to want to sleep nearly at the same hours. Physicians did improve the situation when they asked pilots to stop smoking with the treat to cut the licence.
Searchers discovered that fatigue but also boring tasks may induce these microsleeps : Did you ever pray the Rosary?! Long trips on the highway need stops. Statistic say that road accidents are more serious and numerous arriving in the well-known streets near of home. My father in law died in such an accident crossing a road without respecting the Stop he knew very well and always respected, cutting the way to another car. It was 300 m from his home after a 300 km trip. His sister died too. Her ejected husband and my mother in law and the driver of the other car were severly injured.
The searchers could study 100-200 micro sleeps by long-range pilots...
As flight teacher we know that there is no need to fligh more than 30-45 mn before the student pilot is no more able to assimilate more and has no more enough focus on the flight.
At school, children learn math and physic the morning as they are less tired.
We all have to manage with fatigue, we have to prevent fatigue, but how?
Eventually, when sufficiently deprived of sleep, the human,brain can spontaneously shift from wakefulness to sleep in order to meet its physiological need.
Organizing our personal life in a world in crisis is not only an individual issue. It is a global Society issue increasing with the crisis.
Since they replaced the train in my valley by a tram+train many people going to work are traveling two times a day 1h15 instead 50 mn. Students are coming late and tired at school. Some good workers have been fired as they are no more able to be there at time. Our world is TOO UNSTEADY . Time, money, people, market, politic are unsteady. And so Machinbird is saying us that he is reaching the limit with fatigue, and managing a Business is too unsteady to put in place the former tools to manage fatigue that dubbleyew eight is suggesting. Stabilizing an unsteady world situation with thousand of billions false debts needs time, same rules for everybody, delay not paying more taxes.
Fatigue, boring work like CDA without checking distance/altitude and press-button flights are killing. We need to be master of our fate, of our future, to get free.
The greatest treasure of Society is the Human ware. Men and women need to regain Freedom to organize their life in a more steady way. Thank you Machinbird to share your experience of desorentation after micro-sleeps. If they happen again due to sleep deprivation I hope you can do everything they happen when you are not driving or flying.
Best wishes, Machinbird. You are from the very best by us. Take care to you , we need you!
I recently listened that people who are practicing did not risk to suffer from sleep-apnea I suggest to play harmonica!