How Traditional Aviation Testing Can Inform Unmanned Aerial Technologies

WTS International Honors Rachael Barolsky Sack with a “First of its Kind” Award WTS International recently honored the U.S. DOT Volpe Center’s Small Business Innovation Research program manager for her exceptional leadership and commitment with its “Chapter President of the Year” award—the first honor of its kind granted by the association. Find out what made her stand out.

The Cambridge Science Festival Comes to U.S. DOT’s Volpe Center Science lovers of all ages gathered at U.S. DOT’s Volpe Center to attend transportation events as part of the Cambridge Science Festival, an annual 10-day event that engages an estimated 50,000 people with science, technology, engineering, and math. Find out what our participants did with blocks, simulators, and transportation planning.

Career Opportunity: Center Director for Safety Management and Human Factors We seek a dynamic and innovative leader to serve as Center Director for Safety Management and Human Factors at U.S. DOT’s Volpe National Transportation Systems Center, located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This position oversees five technical divisions. The ideal candidate must have expertise leading applied research and technology projects in safety management systems and/or human factors in the transportation field. Learn more and apply.

Volpe Experts in the Field

Volpe staff engaged in the following noteworthy activities in May and June:

• Automated Vehicles: Dr. Scott Smith moderated a session on automated vehicles at the TRB National Transportation Planning Applications Conference, held May 14-18 in Raleigh, North Carolina.
  
  
• Infrastructure: Luisa Paiewonsky moderated a panel discussion titled “Advocacy for Multimodal Transportation Infrastructure” on May 24 at the Boston Society of Civil Engineers annual Bertram Berger Seminar in Boston, Massachusetts. 
  
  
• Measurement and Modeling: Chris Cutler participated in a NASA flight test of the Tecnam P2006T at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Virginia. This aircraft will later be modified as a NASA X-57 experimental hybrid-electric aircraft. Cutler gathered equipment details and technical information that will help Volpe’s acoustic team prepare for the X-57 flight test and other future measurement campaigns.
  
  
• Measurement and Modeling: Juliet Page led a sonic boom test at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center, located at Edwards Air Force Base in California. The measurements included human social surveys and operational verification of low-boom measurement equipment. These efforts are a precursor to 2018 quiet sonic boom dose-response tests, which will inform an X-plane effort to gather necessary community response data to enable supersonic overland flight.
  
  
• Rail Safety: Dr. Scott Gabree and Bianka Mejia participated in a panel aimed at improving media reporting of suicides that occur on the rail system in the Northeast Corridor. During this event, which was hosted by Amtrak at Penn Station in New York City on June 15, Volpe provided an overview of rail-specific media concerns and preliminary thoughts for how to encourage responsible reporting practices. The panel’s goal is to work with industry to develop recommendations that could be used by stakeholders to help encourage responsible reporting following a rail fatality.
  
  
• Vehicle Safety: Jared Young presented a paper co-authored with Dr. Eric Nadler and Dr. Donald Fisher titled Benefits of One and Two-Stage Crash Warning Systems on Transit Buses at the 25th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles, held June 5-8 in Detroit, Michigan.

Aviation

• Flight Deck Human Factors Issues for National Airspace System (NAS) En Route Controller Pilot Data Link Communications (CPDLC)

Energy

• Potential Environmental Effects of the Leading Edge Hydrokinetic Energy Technology

Hazardous Materials Transportation

• Cargo Tank Incident Study (CTIS): Rollover Data and Risk Framework

Transportation Planning

• Mississippi National River and Recreation Area Water Trail Plan

Vehicle-to-Vehicle Technology

• Estimation of Potential Safety Benefits for Pedestrian Crash Avoidance/Mitigation Systems

Waterways

• St. Lawrence Seaway: Potential Opportunities for the Application of Information and Communication Technologies: Discussion Paper
• St. Lawrence Seaway: Overview of Safety, Efficiency, Operational, and Environmental Issues: Discussion Paper