Use of Virtual Reality in Training
 

Hello,

I spoke with a friend of mine who does avionics training with American Airlines (AA). My friend informed me that AA uses Boeing and Airbus Virtual Reality (VR) Programs.

Does your carrier use VR? If so, to what extent? I think Lufthansa and Jet Blue are using VR to a limited extent.

If your company uses VR, who specifically uses VR? Pilots, Flight Attendants, Mechanics, Rampers, etc.?

Thanks for your help.

Ours has decided to shelve research at present, VR is still a couple of years away from being really usable without issues. The current generation of headsets use fixed focus and limited field of view. This may limit and cause nausea to users and thus from a H&S point limits the ability of the devices.

I think once Oculus releases the next Gen CV2, providing it does feature variable focus and greater resolution and a wider angle , and Vive matches them, then it's more the licencing of software that is the issue from then on. If manufacturers are getting involved, then that can only benefit.

Finally, my 2c worth is the use of VR is in Cockpit procedures training and familiarity with layout. once tactile requirements are introduced, we're still a long way from having a good system available. There's much promising prototype work on tactile feedback gloves and controllers, but unless you have this interactability within the VR environment, it's just a VR paper tiger and not really worth the investment $.

VR will be much more viable for training once foveation and haptics are mastered and implemented. At this stage it is novel and promising but hobbled by the above issues noted by RVF as well as insufficient resolution. That said it is only a matter of time, and the benefits are very real.