Cameras Being Deployed on Aircraft to Improve Safety, Security

Air Safety Week, June 9, 2003

Aviation industry lags rail, maritime sectors in use of video recordings

The cameras are coming. In the not-too-distant future transport category aircraft might well be equipped with closed circuit television systems to cover both interior spaces and the exterior of the aircraft as the technology to do so becomes more compact and capable.

The coming changes import added costs to equip airplanes and significant changes in operational procedures. The net impact could improve both safety and security. The legal ramifications are not yet fully resolved but in-flight video recordings could reduce an operator's liability exposure, and in fact camera coverage may become a necessary adjunct of an operator's legal protection. Installation and maintenance costs of video imagery remain uncertain, but government funding for installation may be needed given the dire financial straits of the industry.

At a Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) transportation recorder symposium last week, a new acronym was presented: AIR. The letters stand for airborne image recorder. In the next few years this acronym could take its place alongside the flight data and cockpit voice recorders (FDR/CVR) in sort of a trilogy of recorder capability: FDR/CVR/AIR.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) co-sponsored the seminar as a follow-up to the board's recorder symposium four years ago (see ASW, May 10, 1999).

The need for a video recording in the cockpit has its roots in the advance of aviation technology. The advent of data-links and text messages, developed in part to reduce the volume of voice message traffic on the radio, meant that the traditional CVR would not capture key elements of air-ground communications. Moreover, the displays in modern glass cockpits are graphical interpretations of the instruments they have replaced, and any anomalies in the translation of electronic data to the visual presentation might present misleading information.

Image recording was seen as a means of picking up CNS/ATM (communication, navigation and surveillance/air traffic management) information as received and displayed to crews in the cockpit. Moreover, image recording of the cockpit was seen as complementing the FDR/CVR, providing a better sense of the environment (e.g., smoke), non-verbal crew communications, a better appreciation for the crew's workload, and so forth.

Accident investigators have asked for a cockpit video recording. Notably, in April 2000 the NTSB called for a cockpit video recording capability in the wake of its investigation into the 1999 crash of EgyptAir Flight 990, and the lack of cockpit imagery in this and other cases that complicated the investigation (see ASW, April 17, 2000 and Nov. 6, 2000). In addition, the Transportation Safety Board (TSB) of Canada has also called for cockpit video recording as a result of its investigation into the 1998 crash of Swissair Flight 111 (see ASW, April 7).

From the advance of CNS/ATM, the limitations of FDR/CVR technology, and the need to better understand the human/machine interface in incidents and accidents, the imperative has emerged for video recording. Indeed, over the last seven years, a working group formed under the auspices of the European Organization for Civil Aviation Equipment (EUROCAE) has been meeting, and in March produced a minimum operational performance specification (MOPS) that sets forth performance parameters for image recording in the cockpit. The document (EUROCAE number ED-112) does not spell out the number of cameras to be installed; rather, it sets forth the desired performance, in terms of update rate (4-5 frames per second) and resolution (sufficient to read the instrument panel).

Over the next three to four years, EUROCAE's ED-112 specification will be transformed into a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) technical standard order (TSO). In terms of regulatory activity, the train has left the station, and operators can expect to see a specific requirement, with implementation deadlines, for cockpit video recording.

Two other factors have accelerated the push for video. The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, led to the installation of hardened cockpit doors, a massive retrofit accomplished by the FAA's April 9 deadline. However, the area immediately outside the cockpit will require camera surveillance, with a monitor in the cockpit. Pilots have to control access to the cockpit; they have to ensure that anyone seeking access to the cockpit does not pose a threat. Moreover, they must be able to do so from their normal seated position, hence the need for video cameras. As an example, by November 2003, all UK-registered airplanes are required to have live image viewing from the pilots' normal seated position of the area directly outside the cockpit door. The FAA and Europe's Joint Aviation Authorities (JAA) have the same regulation under consideration on a longer time scale.

The live imagery, of course, can be recorded to document any future terrorist attacks on the cockpit. By the way, no performance specification has been developed to date for capturing imagery outside of the cockpit. Guidelines are needed urgently, according to symposium participants.