The use of voice regocnition software in Aeronautical industry

The Wright brothers helped usher in the era of commercial aviation, and ever since the first plane took to the skies, there have been a great deal of technological advancements that have increased the speed, safety, and range of air travel. Pope enunciates that the primary focus on safety in aviation technology has resulted in numerous advancements, including the Traffic Collision Avoidance System (TCAS), Ground Proximity Warning Systems (GPWS), and many more. In order to ensure safe and effective flight, the cockpit is equipped with many more devices that help the pilot have a better situational awareness. But as technology in the cockpit advances, the level of operational complexity also rises. As a result, the pilot is forced to look for new knobs and buttons to perform a multitude of tasks during flight. The situational awareness of the pilot is further tasked by the fact that cockpit controls consist of numerous multifunctional keys, displays with menu-type functions, and various layered switches. Simplest tasks in plane control require well-sequenced activities to perform. In the long run, the cockpit tasks have become time-consuming and also take the pilots concentration from the more essential controls. So now suppose voice communication is intergraded in cockpit controls to assist the pilot in manipulating the controls and performing other tasks. What if a pilot could converse with the cockpit using voice recognition software? This paper will first look functional aspect of the voice recognition soft and then discuss the efficiency and safety benefits of integrating voice recognition technology into the aeronautical industry.

If voice recognition soft is integrated, pilot tasks like command entry and status checks will be made much easier due to the cockpit’s congestion with many controls and errors could occur. In stressful situations like when the plane encounters turbulence, the pilot can make mistakes when manually executing tasks. Voice recognition technology has dramatically advanced in the last few decades, and hence some aircraft manufacturers have incorporated voice recognition control in aircrafts and according to (Pope), the new generation fighters like Eurofighters have adopted voice recognition soft to for control and command functions. According to (Adacel), the process of command actuation is as follows: the pilot’s microphone picks the voice command then avionics computer uses preprogrammed cluster of commands to compare with the pilot’s words then selects the command that closely relates to the pilot’s. After that, the command chosen is converted to machine language recognizable to the avionics system then the command is delivered to the relevant subsystem which executes the command

By adopting voice recognition in cockpit functions, the software will present an immediate access to many features during the moments when the pilot controls the plane by hand. One significant area is the cockpits query systems. Instead of the pilot scrolling through menus to check an issue like air pressure levels or fuel levels, using voice recognition, a pilot could give a command, and the computer voice will report as per the query (Adacel). Another area that could be improved by voice recognition is data entry during flight. A pilot always needs to update the flight outline for radio frequencies and the autopilot. With voice inputs like when updating the latitude and longitudes or the operational radio frequency, it is highly unlikely for pilot to state wrong data as compared to manually inputting the data.

Voice recognition control will save a lot of time when performing tasks in the cockpit and therefore a pilot quickly finishes tasks using voice communication and consequently could save fuel consumed by the plane (Speech Recognition Interface Improves Flight Safety). Situational awareness is also significantly improved by voice communication in that a pilot can keep his concentration issues going on outside the plane rather than concentrating on the control panels.

In conclusion, voice recognition soft has and will continue to revolutionize air travel, however, some of the challenges facing the mentioned technology are like extreme noise levels especially when a plane reaches cruise speeds. Another problem is the limited command database because of the numerous hardware resources needed to process the voice commands, and also the fact pilots need to memorize specific commands for efficient execution. Issues of accents and voice alteration due to sickness, vibration, and air pressure pose further challenges. Luckily, with continued improvement of automated speech recognition algorithms, most the mentioned problems are being eliminated.

References

Adacel. “The Benefits of a Speech Recognition Enabled Cockpit.” Adacel Systems Inc Publications (2014): 1-5.

Pope, Steven. Voice-recognition Technology for the Cockpit Maturing Fast. 16 April 2012. 27 November 2017 .

“Speech Recognition Interface Improves Flight Safety.” NASA SPINOFF: Technology Transfer Program 4 March 2013: 2-5.