The KRAKEN Disorientation Device

One of the features most elaborate motion-based simulators lack are the sustained gravitational forces that can have severe effects on a vehicle's crew. That is not the case for the Navy's GL-6000 disorientation research device, better known as "The Kraken." The $19 million monster of a simulator is the centerpiece of the Captain Ashton Graybiel Acceleration Research Facility at Wright Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio that opened in June 2016.

The system weighs a quarter of a million pounds, leverages 4,500 horsepower, and provides simultaneous motion on six axes. In other words, it gives its occupants one hell of a ride.

The goal of this engineering marvel is to allow researchers to evaluate human factors like operational effectiveness, performance, and safety in various moving vehicles as accurately as possible without actually putting anyone (or anything) in danger. And the Kraken is not just about flight, although it can accurately reproduce rotary-wing and fixed-wing aircraft of virtually all types. It can also simulate the motion dynamics of submarines, boats, and land vehicles.

The name of the new center that houses Kraken is a tribute to Captain Ashton Graybiel, a Navy scientist and medical doctor who made groundbreaking advances in acceleration research and its physiological effects during the 1950s and 1960s, then continued making new discoveries all the way through the 1980s. His work included game-changing studies of disorientation, weightlessness, human balance and the body's ability to cope with heavy acceleration. Graybiel's data, reports and research instruments were absolutely essential when it came to NASA's success during the space race.