Heat stress and helicopter pilot errors.

Helicopter pilots are subjected to degrees of heat stress that under laboratory conditions result in decreased performance. However, the effect of heat stress on the frequency of helicopter pilot errors is uncertain. The purpose of this study is to determine whether there is an association between ambient heat stress and pilot error. The records of 500 helicopter accidents and incidents due to pilot error during the months May through October were selected at random. On the day of the event, ambient dry bulb and wet bulb temperatures were recorded and compared to temperature and humidity readings on 1000 days chosen at random over the same time period, after eliminating days where events occurred. There was a significant difference between the dry temperature distributions of the days with pilot error compared with the control group (chi 2 = 47.54, P Language: en