MANILA: The country may soon have an aerospace medicine centre, which would also be the first in Southeast Asia.
The plan to build the country’s first aerospace medicine centre was announced during the First National Technology Forum on Aerospace Medicine and Biology with the theme “Exploring the Frontiers of Aerospace Medicine for the Philippines” at the Enrique Garcia Hall of the Lung Center of the Philippines on Friday.
The proposed Aerodome would be built inside the Lung Center complex.
The Lung Center is taking the lead in the building of the Aerodome as it will be the first to make use of the facility in its bid to be a centre of excellence in aviation and travel medicine in the country.
Engineering students of the Technological Institute of the Philippines were tasked to come up with the design of the state-of-the-art facility, as well as the production of the needed equipment.
Sergio Andres Jr., who is in charge of the Lung Center’s Aerospace, Maritime and Travel Medicine Project, said the project includes the establishment of a human centrifuge or g-force simulator, a human gyroscope laboratory, a hyperbaric and a hypobaric chamber, a free fall/microgravity simulator and jet and helicopter crash simulator, among other medical equipment.
The facility will be initially utilised to serve pilots, air and ground crew personnel from the military and civil aviation industry and in basic and applied research in space medicine.
“This is history in the making,” said Andres, a pulmonologist.
THE PHILIPPINE STAR
