Navy taking major steps on PEs fix

ARLINGTON, Va. – Now that the Navy has ruled out contaminated air as the cause of many of the physiological events (PEs) in fleet pilots flying the F/A-18A-D, F/A-18E/F and EA-18G, the service is focusing on air pressure fluctuations. The Navy is planning a major maintenance of on its jets to try and curb PE rates by adding a new cockpit pressure monitoring and warning system to more than 1,000 of the largest type/model/series. The modification will be it has ever undertaken, according to Physiological Episodes Action Team lead Rear Adm. Fredrick “Lucky” Luchtman. The effort will begin later this year and take about two years, he told USNI News. After PE rates shot up in 2017, the Navy established the PEAT to coordinate cross-community efforts. PEAT found that when components fail in the Environmental Control System, sometimes the air fluctuates within the cockpit, and lead to PE symptoms in the cockpit, according to Luchtman. The team “identified the components that are more likely to fail earlier than we anticipated originally, and those components are under redesign right now.” Among those components: Primary and secondary bleed air regulator valves, the Onboard Oxygen Generation System (OBOGS) and others. In addition to replacing those components, the Navy is about to undertake a massive effort to install the Cockpit Pressure and OBOGS Monitoring Systems (CPOMS) in the 1,000 Hornets, Super Hornets and Growlers. It’s highly unlikely that PEs will forever disappear because of the complex relationship between machine and the human body that the Navy still doesn’t understand. A study at the Navy Experimental Diving Unit’s Fluctuating Altitude Simulation Technology Chamber in Panama City, Fla., put 70 people through pressure fluctuation profiles that had caused PEs in pilots in real life. None of the 70 felt any symptoms. Those results made the team think that the relationship between pressure and the pilot is more involved, says Luchtman, noting that sleep, hydration, nutrition and more can play a role in whether a pilot feels headache, tingling fingers or dizziness symptoms. The fixes the Navy is putting in place stand to have a noticeable impact on the fleet, says Lt. Cmdr. John Supple, spokesperson for PEAT told USNI News. (Source: USNI News 05/02/19) Golden Triangle Note: Pilots that flew in the T-45C Navy trainer at NAS Meridian, Miss., and NAS Pensacola, Fla., also experienced PEs. In early 2018, PEAT leader Rear Adm. Sara Joyner a Senate subcommittee the Navy has brought its T-45 trainer fleet back to full pilot production levels with the installation of CRU-123 solid-state oxygen monitoring units. The units alert the aircrew if oxygen pressure falls and allows them more time to take corrective action to prevent a PE.