Passenger should wear reflective vest and safety knowledge is a key factor in determining the possibility of surviving any danger situation that may occur on a scheduled airliner. Unfortunately, research carried out by civil aviation agencies, and in particular the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), has shown serious problems of effectiveness in the instructions that airlines use on board to inform passengers about safety procedures. For this reason, for years FAA reports have invited airlines to consider creating more creative and interactive versions of instructions to make them easier to learn and more engaging for passengers.
A new free application for Android and apple, called “Air Safety World”, now offers the world’s first opportunity to test the interactive aviation guidance for the future. In them, two virtual flight assistants, equipped with their artificial intelligence, guided the user with personalized feedback as he seeks to actively perform the procedures in faithfully replicated 3D airliners. The free application includes interactive experiences on the main safety issues on board: take the brace position, wear the lifejacket, wear oxygen masks, find emergency outlets on the most common types of aircraft Line, and open the various types of aircraft doors.
The app is one of the results of an international research project that I manage and that our HCI Lab from the University of Udine is working with the Cabin Safety Research Team of the FAA. The new training modes were evaluated with user studies, presented at the 8th Triennial International Fire and Cabin Safety Research Conference, recently held in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The results of the studies have shown that making interactive aviation safety instructions improves their effectiveness: users who received safety instructions through interactive 3D content exploration made fewer mistakes and were faster in performing the procedures, Such as wearing a reflective jacket, in the real world.
In addition to interactive security instructions, “Air Safety World” also explores gasification scenarios, including several different genre games that transform key aviation security messages into fun experiences. Recent air strikes have dramatically demonstrated that messages like ‘leaving all luggages on the plane’ were not received by passengers. Game insertions in the app allow the user to play emergency situations easily, and empirically learn about the effects of correct behavior or not. For example, they put the player with safety vest as the coordinator of the evacuation of a crowd of passengers from the aircraft or they engage with a hurdle run made of emergency doors of planes that need to be quickly opened. Users can also build their own fleet of airliners taken from the real world, inspect them and send them flying to the world.