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Completed TRL 3 (started at 3, targeting 7)
The highest priority at Wallops Flight Facility is the safety for all employees, customers, and the public for all Project Operations. Per NASA/Goddard Values – the first listed items is SAFETY. “We accomplish amazing feats often involving things that have never been attempted. In all we do, we first ensure our employees, the infrastructure entrusted to us, and most importantly, the public, are safe. Safety permeates and informs all that we do.” However, with increasing launch rates comes great resource challenges, especially in a time where new technologies are being tested at the [desired] fastest pace possible. This paradigm creates a continuous resource deficit with the limited staff in the ground safety office. Furthermore, surges in commercial and government activity, new FAA regulations, and quasi government partners, create higher workloads for seemingly repeat activities. Wallops Ground Safety Team is looking to discover the capabilities and limitations for Artificial Intelligence (AI) to supplement current workloads/workflows.
The overall goal of this project is to explore the ability for AI to augment the Wallops Ground Safety team in the data receiving organization, processing, and product development. The candidate products currently are Ground Safety Data Packages, Ground Safety Plans, Procedures, Fueling Procedures, Payload Safety Data Packages, and similar safety products. Hazards that are desired to be evaluated include Explosives, Pressure, Chemical, Lifting, Electrical, Facility, Occupational Health, Laser, and Radio Frequency. Wallops Ground Safety is looking achieve this goal by working through the three “levels” of AI to create a useful and usable solution. These are (1) level 1 minimum success – approved “Librarian” AI capability, (2) success level 2 – “cognitive reasoning/co-pilot” capability, and (3) level 3 full success – “Generative/Convertive” capability.
Sub-goals per phase include:
Level 1 “Librarian” – Discovery the capabilities and limitations of AI and build the knowledge database for the AI. This Phase is already in work with active internships within Wallops Ground Safety Branch.
Level 2 “Co-Pilot” – Implement its usage in calculations and operations scheduling/deconfliction. Stretch to support flight safety team calculations. This Phase is part of the proposal request.
Level 3 “Convertive” – Using generative AI to perform compliance review, predict hazards, or offer new solutions. This Phase is part of the proposal request.
Current project timelines for a new customer entry to operations vary from 330 days to 120 days minimum. It is envisioned that this timeline could be reduced by 50-80%, depending on the level of AI involvement.
Efficiency rate improvements are unknown at this time, but estimating between 25-50% efficiency in generating documents, compliance reviewing documents, and complex/multi-hazard deconfliction scenarios. These efficiency rates could equate to 1 – 4 FTE. Or better stated – make a 12-person workforce function as a 13-16 person workforce.
Other efficiencies could exist in prioritizing the work for Ground Safety Analysts so that more time is spent on complex/multi-hazard/high hazard tasks, rather than low hazards that may consume valuable human time. Prescriptive solutions may see significantly higher efficiency rates from AI support.
We also must remain open minded that AI may result in an even higher level of safety than what we are currently operating as it might be able to be “throttled” for quality, predict/recognize trends, or look for solutions that are unknown by local staff but are available in larger databases.
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