PEGASAS Inspires a River of Research

The myth of Pegasus holds that by stamping his hooves on the summit of Mount Helicon, the winged white horse released a flow of sacred waters “whence the Muses quaffed their richest draughts of inspiration.” So it seems very appropriate that the acronym for the FAA’s Center of Excellence (COE) Partnership to Enhance General Aviation Safety, Accessibility and Sustainability — PEGASAS — should invoke the story of everyone’s favorite flying equine.

To be sure, the PEGASAS effort is all about creativity. Everyone in GA can list the challenges facing our community, with the majority of these falling within one of the three categories that form this COE’s name: safety, accessibility, and sustainability. As officially stated, therefore, the mission of PEGASAS is to “enhance general aviation safety, accessibility, and sustainability by partnering the FAA with a national network of world-class researchers, educators and industry leaders.”

The Wellspring of Creativity

The inspiring flow of research work from the PEGASAS program began in September 2012, when then-Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced the selection of a COE team led by Purdue University, Ohio State University, and the Georgia Institute of Technology, with the Florida Institute of Technology, Iowa State University, and Texas A&M University rounding out the core team. Affiliate members of the partnership include Arizona State University, Florida A&M, Hampton University, Kent State University, North Carolina A&T State University, Oklahoma State University, Southern Illinois University (Carbondale), Tufts University, Western Michigan University, and University of Minnesota, Duluth.

To underscore the very practical and (so to speak) well-grounded nature of PEGASAS research projects, the PEGASAS COE announcement included the observation that three of the six core members (Purdue, Ohio State, and Texas A&M) own and operate their own airports, with the remaining partners maintaining facilities, aircraft, and close working relationships with their own community airports.

Navigating the Creative Stream

Since then, PEGASAS has launched 30 research projects that support the FAA in ways that, as its name implies, enhance general aviation safety, accessibility, and sustainability. Specific topic areas include Airport Technology, Airport Safety, Airport Research and Development, Airport Pavements, Software and Systems, Human Factors, Weather Technology in the Cockpit, and Structures and Propulsion. Eighteen of the 30 projects are still active, and two new projects with the FAA’s Flight Deck Human Factors Research Lab at the Civil Aerospace Medical Institute (CAMI) launched at the beginning of 2016. PEGASAS also works with the General Aviation Joint Steering Committee (GAJSC) as a participant in several of its teams for safety and issue analysis.

To conduct this work, PEGASAS uses a partnership of principal investigators from the participating universities. As part of the COE mission to develop the next generation of experts, both graduate-level and undergraduate students participate as well. In this connection, during the summer of 2016, PEGASAS launched its first “Center of Excellence Summer Experience” program. This effort involved having nine students from various PEGASAS universities working with researchers in the Aviation Research Division at the William J. Hughes Technical Center, and in the Flight Deck Human Factors Laboratory at CAMI.

Loosely using the “Aviate-Navigate-Communi­cate-Mitigate” approach we have used to frame the presentation of stories in the past few issues of FAA Safety Briefing, we will explore some of the ongoing PEGASAS work, with special focus on projects whose benefits are likely to flow into GA operations. So join us, and go with the flow! (FAA Safety Briefing – MayJun2018)