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Great Demo on Importance of a Good Scan

terrykohler

Well Known Member
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Motion-Induced Blindness
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This is a great illustration of what we were taught about scanning outside the cockpit when I went through training. We were told to scan the horizon for a short distance, stop momentarily, and repeat the process. I can remember******being told why this was the most effective technique to locate other aircraft. It was emphasized repeatedly to not fix your gaze for more than a couple of seconds on any single object. The instructors, some of whom were veterans with years of experience, instructed us to continually "keep our eyes moving and our head on a swivel" because this was the best way to survive, not only in combat, but from peacetime hazards (like a midair collision) as well.
We basically had to take the advice on faith (until we could experience for ourselves) because the technology to demonstrate it didn't exist at that time. Click on the link below for a demonstration ...
http://www.msf-usa.org/motion.html
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*Terry, CFI
RV9A N323TP
 
WOW

It only took me about 30 seconds to lose the first dot. That's an amazing resource that I plan to pass along to all my pilot friends. This may save my life someday and that's why Doug gets my donation every year. Thanks for giving us somewhere to put these things into public knowledge.
 
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Blinking

If I blinked continuously the yellow spots persisted.

Not sure what that means.
 
Amazing stuff

Thanks for posting this. I tried to post this link a few weeks ago but couldn't get it to paste. Very "eye" opening!!!:eek:

I've showed this to several people. Everyone is pretty amazed.
 
Cool demo but...

I get a chance to fly with alot of different pilots and 99 percent of them are so focused on the inside of the airplane that scan technique is irrelevent. Take what you learn from this and increase the time you spend looking outside the airplane.

CM :eek:
 
If I blinked continuously the yellow spots persisted.

Not sure what that means.

I looked up a few research articles on it, and it's quite fascinating. Basically if you remove the "stimulus" (the moving pattern), your visual perception stabilises.

So blinking or closing your eyes has much the same effect as looking away and focusing on something else for a short while. It sort of "resets" your visual perception system, for want of a better term.

Scientists still don't know exactly what it is that's going on between the eyes and brain which causes the illusion, but there are a couple of competing theories which are being researched to try to better understand it.
 
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