Background: Air transportation of personnel to offshore oil platforms is one of the major hazards of this kind of endeavor. Pilot performance is a key factor in the safety of the transportation system.
Objective: This study seeks to identify the ergonomic factors present in pilots' activities that may in some way compromise or enhance their performance, the constraints and affordances which they are subject to; and where possible to link these to their associated risk factors.
Methods: Methodology adopted in this project studies work in its context. It is a merging of Activity Analysis (Guerin et al. 2001) of European tradition with Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA - www.ctaresource.com) articulated with the recent approaches to cognitive systems engineering developed by Professors David Woods and Erik Hollnagel. Fifty-five hours of field interviews provided the input for analysis.
Results: Sixteen ergonomic constraints were identified, some cognitive, some physical, all considered relevant by the research subjects and expert advisers.
Conclusions: Although the safety record of the personnel transportation system studied is considered acceptable, there is low hanging fruit to be picked which can help improve the system's safety.
Keywords: Cognitive ergonomics; cognitive task analysis; helicopter operation; safety.