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VIRTHUALIS (Virtual Reality and Human Factors Applications for Improving Safety) is the largest European Research Project in Industrial Safety within EU’s Sixth Framework Programme.
The VIRTHUALIS Project (Contract no. NMP-515831-2) started on 1st May 2005, and is set out to run for four years. A network of European experts in the HF, VR and Process Industry domains have been clustered in centres of references in order to produce fit-for-the-purpose tools. 28 Partners from 12 different European countries are currently taking part to the Project.
VIRTHUALIS is pursuing a unique approach to a problem shared by the thousand of process industries in the world in active production: SAFETY.
The human and economic costs of accidents worldwide can be shocking. In 2004 industrial workplace accidents killed one person every two hours and injured one person every five seconds. The cost of accidents at work and occupational diseases ranged for most countries from 2.6 to 3.8% of Gross National Product. (Source: EUROSTAT).
Up to 85% of accidents can be traced back to human & organisational factors causes: unclear management structure, unavailability of information, lack of coordination, ineffective training, procedure difficult to use, inadequate investigation for the causes of most recurring problems, and deviations from safety procedures are among the main causes.
VIRTHUALIS response to the magnitude of this challenge is the creation of a technology allowing Human Factors expertises to be widely available to end-users by embedding them in Virtual Environments.