Designing New and Improved Cockpits Could Prevent Future Flight Tragedies

After the most recent flight tragedy of the Germanwings flight crash caused by suicidal pilot Andreas Lubitz, people are finally starting to realize that airplanes need to redesign their cockpits to prevent future tragedies from happening. Fastco Design posted what they believed to be a design solution.

We have seen numerous in-flight tragedies over the past few decades and most have been caused by suicidal pilots/copilot and also we have seen 9/11 terrorist attacks.

The design solution for the cockpits:

  • Having the cockpit be truly sealed throughout the duration of the flight
  • Within the cockpit area there would be a toilet and a slot to slip food and drinks through
  • Very long flights would include a cot within the cockpit area
  • Video recordings of inside the cockpit area

This redesign could really prevent future tragedies and save innocent lives.

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Life Paint by Volvo

Ever come close to hitting someone riding a bike late at night? I am sure we have all have had scary encounters similar to that one. Most of the time the reflectors on bikes are not good enough, other times there are none on the bike being used and the person riding the bike is in very dark clothing.

Well, problem solved with Volvo’s new product; Life Paint. LifePaint by Volvo is a spray paint that a person can spray on their entire bike, helmet and clothing and it appears invisible during the day and glows in the dark at night. The particles in the paint stick together and to the objects that it is sprayed onto. I think this product will really take off because it is a much-needed solution to a very big problem. Most hit and runs that I have seen on the news are bike riders getting hit by cars.

The benefits of Life Paint:

  1. It is easy to use
  2. It doesn’t ruin clothing because it is invisible during the day
  3. Makes riding bikes during night hours a lot safer
  4. By 2020 no one will be killed or seriously injured  by a new Volvo

Check it out:

Wearables: The New Designs of Fashion

I cam across a core77 blog post about embracing the wild world of wearables, or design pieces incorporated into fashion. I found it interesting with the unveiling of the Apple Watch today, so I gave it a look.

With tons of wearables incorporated into fashionable designs like cameras, devices that track your calories, steps and heart rate as well as shoes that have a GPS tracking device inside of them, I think wearables are becoming more and more popular. My personal favorite is the GoPro wearable cameras that have helmets to attach to as well as harnesses and so much more.

ralph lauren tech shirt

The blog post explores the ideas that can come along when the worlds of technology, fashion, and wellness collide, which we are already seeing this happen with the wrist bands that are out that sync to your smartphones and calculate certain areas of health in your body etc. We even see this in the actual fabric of clothing as developed by Under Armor and Ralph Lauren Polo Tech shirts that track fitness stats. One of the cooler wearable designs that I found out about through this blog post was that of the Blooms Technologies Pregnancy Monitor, which tracks a woman’s pregnancy preferably in the 3rd trimester. It tracks contractions and syncs the information to the smartphone of the user so that it gives the mom piece of mind.

blooms pregnacy monitor

What do you think will be the next big thing in wearable designs?

watches

Worst Designs Ever

I came across a blog post on fastcodesign’s blog about a competition they will be holding for the world’s worst designs. I thought this was great and interesting as well. They give you a place where you can make suggestions and will be taking suggestions up until March 5th and then next week will post the finalists.

I honestly can’t wait tot see the finalists they choose because let’s be honest, there are a lot of brilliant and great design ideas and finished designs in the world but there are others that make you stop and think what were they thinking when they came up with that? The areas of design that will be looked at are product design, graphic design, digital design, and architecture and urbanism.

I suggested the armrests in movie theaters because I was just at the movies on Valentines Day with my fiancé and we both were wondering why is it that they only have three armrests? If you aren’t there with a significant other it is really awkward when sitting next to a total stranger. Basically it is whoever gets it first because there isn’t a pair for every seat in the theater and that is one of those “what were they thinking?” situations.

armrests

So what do you think will be considered in the list of bad designs?

Folding Sleds

Browsing through  the Swiss-Miss design blog, I found a product that struck me as something New York could have definitely used during this winter’s arctic blasts and snowfall. Get ready New Yorkers for Max Frommeld and Arno Mathies Folding sled an (imitation of the design of a Davos Sled), a kickstarter project currently in development in London, Europe.

folding sled

Again this completely ties into what we are doing for our design class project because it uses ethnographic research to come up with this newly designed product to fit the lifestyles of the 21st century.

The folding sled is:

  1. Reliable
  2. Easy-to-use
  3. Fits in any small compact space (if you live in New York that is the yes feature) not only for NYC people but anyone because it is easy to transport and fit multiple sleds in the trunk of your car when traveling with many kids.
  4. Great for any user.

folding sled 2

Check out more about the Folding Sled by clicking on the Folding Sled hyperlink above!