Author Description

An analysis was made of the aircrew centered system design aspects for the MH-53E helicopter. These aircrew centered design features included changes in the cockpit, aircraft weight, and drag coefficient. The cockpit evaluation compared the current MH-53E cockpit configuration with design changes currently under review by the Navy. This evaluation suggests that the proposed cockpit design display change may reduce aircrew load stress and improve mission effectiveness. Changes in subsystem components may either increase or decrease the weight of the MH-53E. Similarly, changes in crew tasking may result in a need for more or less fuselage volume size. Therefore, the sensitivity of MH-53E performance to generic changes in weight and drag was investigated in order to make source assessment of equipment and crew tasking changes upon MH-53E mission effectiveness.