Plow simulator offers real-world training
to Airmen

Guest Author: Carl Vaughn, Mountain Home area foreman

With winter looming, the Mountain Home Air Force Base’s Civil Engineering Squadron Winter Operations Director David Kinney reached out to the Idaho Transportation Department for snowplow training. Being a longtime employee at the base, Kinney realized there are local resources available to him.  He reached out to me as the local ITD foreman in Mountain Home to see if the Snowplow Simulator was available for them to train new airmen and employees.

Kinney has a unique training situation, as airmen stationed at Mt. Home come from all over the world. Some of them have never even seen snow, hailing from tropical places like Guam or Puerto Rico. The controlled training environment of the simulator is a huge benefit to them and a cost savings to the organization.

There are several advantages of using a Plow Simulator for training. Relevant driving skills can be consistently practiced over and over again in a simulated truck on the road. The trainee gets more driving experience in less time, which greatly enhances training efficiency. Here are the other advantages of using a simulator:

- Separate driving tasks; lane changing, school crossings,and speed bumps can be practiced and repeated without the trainee being distracted by other dangers on the road.
- Consistent and immediate feedback by the virtual instructor can enhance the speed of learning for the student.
- Complete and reliable evaluation after each lesson or task. The progress of the student is documented automatically and all aspects of the driving tasks can be evaluated for clarity to the student.
- All students can receive the same training content, along with all aspects of the driving task. Examples are: gear shifting, snow covered roads, low visibility to even heavy traffic conditions.
- Training in a safe environment without the stress of real traffic around them to inhibit the efficient development of skills.
- The instructor can add fatigue levels to the student driver, so they understand how fatigue can affect their driving ability. 
- A sufficient supply of instructive traffic situations. During an hour of driving on the road in a real plow, the occurrence of instructive traffic situations varies a lot. Sometimes nothing happens and sometimes there’s a lot of traffic. The real world is very unpredictable. For efficient learning, you need predictable and carefully chosen learning situations so students gain the most knowledge.
- Fewer hours in a real truck on the road requires less fuel, which is beneficial to the environment.
- Special circumstances, such as night driving, snow, ice, fog and even a flat tire, can be practiced anytime.
- Cost effective: If a student is in a crash or damages parked cars during a simulation, there is no cost associated to the training. Just reset the program and off you go again. It’s that simple. 

Overall, this was a great experience for both the MHAFB trainees and it helped continue good relations between ITD and the Base. I am glad our two agencies could make use of the simulator tool to improve safe operations on the roads in our area.


Published 01-04-19