Certified Ejection Seat Weight Ranges and their Effects on Personnel Selection

Abstract

Current ejection seat certified aircrew weight ranges (136 to 213 lbs.), such as for the F/A-18, prohibited over one third (38%) of women and (8%) of men from accessing the naval aviation strike pipeline (carrierbased aviation) between 2008 and 2013. This is deleterious to the Naval Aviation Enterprise to restrict access of otherwise qualified and talented applicants to the strike aviation pipeline due to an outdated anthropometric survey based specification. The acceptable level of risk that was utilized by the Naval Aviation Systems Command was overly conservative and needs to be updated to align with current operational risk management principles, actual ejection seat performance mishap data and the naval aviation anthropometric population. This research is a deep exploration of all aspects of this issue and makes recommendations that can be used by Commander of Naval Air Forces in establishing an operational weight limit for all ejection seat aircraft.