Research on Error Proofing Design of Boeing and Airbus Cockpit from Pilots Survey

Human errors are main causes of most aircraft accidents. Fighting on human errors is important mission of aircraft designer as well as pilot and air traffic controller. Error proofing design for controls in aircraft cockpit is one of the design goals of ergonomics. According to human error management for flight crew, the error proofing design methods are established. A questionnaire which was composed of 25 closed-ended questions were designed for collecting the pilot view. The questionnaire was tested from two respects of reliability and validity. 125 valid questionnaires were collected altogether. The analysis is divided into two parts: the degree of safety support and the frequency. Then by analyzing data from each question, including mean and variance of Boeing and Airbus, the paper studies on the differences and similarities between Boeing and Airbus aircraft in error proofing design. It studies the reasons for the different efforts of error proofing design between Boeing and Airbus aircraft. The paper also considers the effects of pilots’ age on every question. Regression analysis is used for analyzing the variation tendency with age. The result is that pilots consider that the design in Boeing cockpit has superior maneuverability while design in Airbus cockpit do better in logical protection than Boeing. The paper provides a reference for the study of error proofing design in the cockpit.