omVR

Safety Training in a Virtual Refinery: The project omVR allows to practice safety- related behaviour in a virtual refinery. The project was initiated by the Austrian oil company OMV Schwechat and is currently developed by the FAW and GUP, both institutes of the University of Linz. Using a head-mounted display (HMD) the trainee navigates through parts of a refinery finding a working environment he or she is well familiar with. The trainee has to fulfill jobs given by a trainer who may interactively initiate "events" as, for instance, outpouring gas, caustic fluids etc. The trainee in turn has to react to those apparently casual events, thus practicing the safety-related behaviour. The Virtual Reality technique allows for immersive and at the same time practical safety training whenever conventional training methods are either too dangerous (outpouring gas,caustic fluids etc.), too expensive (training on operating or idle plants), or insufficiently immersive (video films, seminars, etc.). A first prototype has been implemented on a Silicon Graphics O2 graphic workstation using the 3D description language VRML. The prototype realizes a training scene called "Behaviour in an H2S area", which allows to practice within dangerous parts of a refinery. Further training scenes will be realized until the end of the year 2000 and integrated within a comprehensive package for safety training in refineries.