NASA to launch advanced air mobility noise perception study
April 23, 2025
NASA has initiated a public proposal on its plans to conduct a psychoacoustic test to “better understand human noise response to passenger and equivalent cargo-carrying Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) aircraft”.
Noting that “insufficient data exists on how humans will respond to AAM aircraft noise,” NASA therefore seeks to gather information on the human noise response to this novel type of aircraft through the Varied AAM Noise and Geographic Area Response Difference (VANGARD) laboratory test.
During the experiment, recorded and reproduced sounds of different AAM aircraft flyovers will be played to participants stationed at their own computers, who will be asked for their “annoyance response” to each sound. Crucially, the study is not designed to affect noise policy; but rather, intended to “allow subsequent studies on human noise response to AAM aircraft to be more informed in their design and test objectives”.
Several key metrics will be studied, including whether annoyance responses differ between residents of ‘low’ or ‘high’ ambient noise environments, and whether inherent noise sensitivity plays a part. Responses during takeoff, cruise and landing phases of flight will also be analysed, including whether proximity to takeoff and landing sites impacts respondents’ answers.
This study will be advancing understanding in a different direction to NASA’s previous AAM work, which focused on measuring the noise profile of aircraft themselves. In 2022, NASA’s inaugural eVTOL noise perception study conducted over two weeks of testing with Joby’s full-scale pre-production aircraft. Carried out as part of NASA’s Advanced Air Mobility National Campaign, the aircraft registered the equivalent of 45.2 dB from 400m at 100kts, a sound level Joby believes will “barely be perceptible against the ambient environment of cities”.
In 2023, a report by the UK’s CAA highlighted that as a “growing area of research,” studies into eVTOL noise “include the development of exposure-response relationships for annoyance and perceptions of noise characteristics;” concluding that “the impact on sleep disturbance will need to be understood more clearly, as well as the role non-acoustic factors will play with this type of noise exposure and response”.
