During a mission several hours long, fighter pilots can't exactly pull over to the side of the road for a pit stop, and many military jets are too small to
house a bathroom. That's why the Advanced Mission Extender Device, or AMXD, is heralding sighs of relief for more than one reason.Omni Medical Solutions rose to a challenge posed
by the Department of Defense to improve in-flight bladder relief and, with $5 million in federal and private funding, came up with the AMXD. It's a control unit that joins a bag to a rubber hose affixed to a diaper, and it has no fluid limit. Pilots, both male and female, only have to unzip to use it.
The current in-flight relief method involves little more than urinating into "
piddle packs," but, for a pilot, that means unbuckling from the flight harness and sometimes even turning around in a tight space — while continuing to fly. If it sounds dangerous, that's because it is. Planes have even gone down because of it.
So far, the Air Force has only purchased 300 AMXD systems for its pool of 4,200 pilots who fly aircraft without a proper latrine. The unit
has already seen some action, however, as the AMXD was used by female helicopter pilots from the Netherlands who fought in Afghanistan.
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05-21-2008, 07:40 PM
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