SBIR/STTR Award attributes
Live exercises and classroom training are the mainstream methods employed to train USAF aircraft maintainers. These training methods require costly expert instructors and equipment, and are limited in their ability to demonstrate realistic—and potentially dangerous—maintenance failures. While games and intelligent tutoring systems have been used to address some of these limitations (Guarino et al., 2018), many of these tools are still designed for use in a classroom environment. Once maintainers are deployed, they cannot access training tools to support refresher training, creating the potential for skill decay. Maintainers need a just-in-time training solution that helps them review and execute these rare procedures as faulty equipment is discovered, without leaving their post. To address this gap, we propose to adapt our TRL-9 adaptive virtual maintenance trainer, MAGPIE, into the Evaluation-Driven Active Guide for Learning Maintenance Events (EAGLE), a just-in-time training solution for relearning and executing aircraft maintenance procedures. EAGLE will combine virtual and augmented reality training with predictive assessment to provide early detection of potential errors and guide maintainers to address those errors before they cause costly issues for the aircraft, thereby ensuring safe and effective maintenance execution.
