The military aviation environment experiences very high noise levels often reaching 150 dB. Hearing protection devices for support and maintenance personnel provide inadequate noise protect. In addition, ground personnel usually lack any means of communication other than human voice (shouting). Operational safety is dependent upon flight line crew communication and situational awareness. High noise levels degrade this awareness and affect hearing health which can degrade mission capabilities. Advanced Hearing Products, Inc. (AHP) proposes an innovative approach to protecting personnel from hearing damage while enabling effective voice communications and situational awareness. This Hearing Protection Device with Communication solution is an effective hearing protection headset that compresses high noise to acceptable levels while transmitting voice and environment sound at adjustable amplified levels. Noise exposure levels are recorded and users are passively alerted when daily allowed noise doses are exceeded. The Phase I technical objective is to determine the feasibility of developing the AHP approach for hearing protection in the military aviation environment. AHP will utilize its extensive experience in hearing protection technology and devices to develop the innovative product. AHP has developed and manufactures several hearing protection products with talk-through capability for use in high-noise environments
