Monitoring of a maintenance intervention on an aircraft

• US 10,360,306 B2
• Filed: 07/24/2015
• Issued: 07/23/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 07/29/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Airbus
• Original Assignee: Airbus
• Inventors: Ordy, Bernard, Jacquemin, Alexis, Chamaillard, Sylvain, Jastrzebski, Eric
• Primary Examiner(s): Singh, Gurkanwaljit
• Application Number:
  US14/808,863
• Publication Number:
  US 20160031570A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,460 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: B64F 5/40 Maintaining or repairing aircraft
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/014 comprising information/image processing systems
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/0178 Eyeglass type eyeglass details G02C
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 27/0093 with means for monitoring data relating to the user, e.g. head-tracking, eye-tracking
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/418 Total factory control, i.e. centrally controlling a plurality of machines, e.g. direct or distributed numerical control [DNC], flexible manufacturing systems [FMS], integrated manufacturing systems [IMS] or computer integrated manufacturing [CIM]
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/35453 Voice announcement, oral, speech input
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/35495 Messages to operator in multimedia, voice and image and text
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/32 with visual or acoustical indication of the functioning of the machine
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/016 Input arrangements with force or tactile feedback as computer generated output to the user
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/30 Semantic analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/40 Processing or translation of natural language natural language analysis G06F40/20; semantic analysis G06F40/30
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06398 Performance of employee with respect to a job function
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/20 Administration of product repair or maintenance
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/1822 Parsing for meaning understanding
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/26 Speech to text systems G10L15/08 takes precedence

Abstract

The disclosure herein relates to ensuring the mutual understanding between a remote maintenance support engineer guiding a maintenance engineer intervening on an aircraft, and concerns a system of prevention comprising first and second communication terminals to enable the maintenance engineer and remote maintenance support engineer to exchange information with each other, the information including oral guidance instructions given by the maintenance support engineer and oral responses given by the maintenance engineer relating to the execution of the instructions, a voice recognition device configured for transforming the oral instructions and responses into textual instructions and responses, a semantic analysis device configured for comparing the textual instructions with the textual responses in order to detect any possible inconsistency between the instructions and the responses, and a warning device configured for generating a warning when an inconsistency is detected between the instructions and the responses.

Claims

1. A maintenance monitoring system for monitoring an intervention by a maintenance engineer on an aircraft remotely guided by a maintenance support engineer, comprising:

first and second communication terminals configured to enable the maintenance engineer and remote maintenance support engineer to exchange information with each other, the information including oral guidance instructions given by the maintenance support engineer and oral responses given by the maintenance engineer relating to execution of the instructions;

a voice recognition device configured for transforming the oral instructions and responses into textual instructions and textual responses;

a semantic analysis device configured for extracting one or more instruction keywords from the textual instructions and one or more response keywords from the textual responses and comparing the textual instructions, including the one or more instruction keywords, with the textual responses, including the one or more response keywords, in order to detect any possible inconsistency between the textual instructions and the textual responses; and

a warning device configured for generating a warning when an inconsistency is detected between the textual instructions and the textual responses.

2. The system as claimed in claim 1 further comprising:

a content comparator configured for comparing at least one portion of the textual instructions and results with theoretical maintenance task data contained in a maintenance procedure document; and

the warning device being configured for generating a warning when an inconsistency is detected between theoretical maintenance task data and the textual instructions and results.

3. The system as claimed in claim 2 further comprising:

a status comparator configured for comparing in real time a set of parameters coming from the aircraft with theoretical maintenance task data contained in the maintenance procedure document; and

the warning device being configured for generating a warning when an inconsistency is detected between theoretical maintenance task procedure data and the aircraft'"'"'s parameters.

4. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the voice recognition device is configured for retranscribing the instructions and results onto the first and second communication terminals.

5. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the warning device is configured for simultaneously sending the warning to the maintenance support engineer and to the maintenance engineer or only to one of them.

6. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the voice recognition and semantic analysis devices are suitable for self-learning.

7. The system claimed in claim 1, comprising a translation device.

8. The system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the voice recognition, semantic analysis and warning devices are installed in the first and second communication terminals.

9. A method for monitoring an intervention by a maintenance engineer on an aircraft remotely guided by a maintenance support engineer, comprising:

providing a first communication terminal and a second communication terminal, both configured to enable an exchange of information, the information comprising oral guidance instructions and oral responses relating to an execution of the instructions;

exchanging information, including the oral guidance instructions, between the maintenance engineer and the remote maintenance support engineer via the first communication terminal and the second communication terminal;

executing steps of the oral guidance instructions on the aircraft;

communicating the oral response between the first communication terminal and the second communication terminal, that steps of the oral guidance instructions have been executed;

transforming, by a voice recognition device, the oral instructions and oral responses into textual instructions and textual responses;

using a semantic analysis device to extract one or more instruction keywords from the textual instructions and one or more response keywords from the textual responses;

comparing, by the semantic analysis device, the textual instructions, including the one or more instruction keywords, with the textual responses, including the one or more response keywords, in order to detect any possible inconsistency between the textual instructions and the textual responses; and

generating a warning by a warning device, when an inconsistency is detected between the textual instructions and the textual responses.