US soldiers have to rewire their brains to learn to fly drones — it's not like flying other aircraft

First publishedJul 17, 11:05 UTC

Last updatedJul 17, 13:52 UTC · 5m ago

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Business Insider6US soldiers have to rewire their brains to learn to fly drones — it's not like flying other aircraftJul 17, 11:05 UTCOpen ↗

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The Army is teaching soldiers to fly drones as it races to catch up in drone warfare.FPV pilots must build "new neural pathways" to fly aircraft they cannot physically feel.Simulators help soldiers develop the skills without repeatedly crashing costly drones.US Army trainers teaching soldiers to fly drones are trying to get them to rewire their brains so that they can master a form of flying and fighting unlike piloting conventional aircraft.Soldiers first learn to fly drones on simulators and, when they get good enough, transition to live flight. One of their biggest challenges is adjusting to the unfamiliar sensation of remote flight.Maj. Rachel Martin, director of the US Army's new drone lethality course, the service's effort to catch up on drone warfare, told Business Insider that "I think the biggest skill gap still that comes with the flight is learning how to fly with goggles."When flying a first-person-view (FPV) drone, "you are looking through a small camera on the front of the aircraft, and you are not receiving physical inputs of what that aircraft is doing."Rethinking flightSoldiers are "training, quite frankly, new neural pathways on what it's like to see something that you can't personally feel — the aircraft's turning right or the aircraft's turning left — like you would with driving a car or riding a bike." Conventional aircraft give physical feedback, but they're not getting that here.Students are trying to make "sure that your brain understands what it's visually seeing," Martin said, and their physical reactions reveal the effort involved."When we're in the simulator, if a student's turning left, you'll see a lot of students turning their body as they're flying. They're not in the aircraft, but their body wants to feel like what they're seeing."The students instinctively move as though they were sitting inside a jet or helicopter rather than controlling a small aircraft from a distance.Helicopter pilots can physically feel the aircraft banking, climbing, or turning as they fly, Martin said.

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  US soldiers have to rewire their brains to learn to fly drones — it's not like flying other aircraft

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