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downwind
31st May 2007, 13:45
Guys,
Doing a project for university and wondering on your thoughts of these hypothetical systems for future commerical jetliners?
1. Escape manoeuvrers for EGPWS equipped aircraft that are in the commercial component of aviation. For example an aircraft gets a terrain warning from the EGPWS and the flight crew do not react, the aircraft computer will automatically pitch the aircraft up and make it fly an avoidance manoeuvre to prevent it hitting terrain.
2. When the gear warning horn for the an aircraft is activated by the EGPWS and the flight crew are to busy and miss the fact that they are about to do a gear up landing, below 2500 AGL and within certain speed and configuration parameters the gear will automatically lower to prevent a wheels up landing.
3. When a commercial organisation buys a new aircraft ie.. Boeing/Airbus the way they want the pilots to fly the aircraft can be even more automated by the automatic selection of takeoff and landing profiles and cruise configurations as per the airline customer’s SOP’s.
4. To prevent taxi and runway incursions the flight crew could have the HUD display hooked up to a ground based moving map display and when the aircraft requests start and pushback ATC, would download the taxi route and runway destination into the moving map and the pilots will follow this via their HUD’s. When the aircraft gets to an intersection, hold etc… a voice would tell them to turn left/right/stop/caution/you are at the destination runway.
Are Mr boeing/airbus already thinking of stuff like this???
thank you
DW!

Rainboe
31st May 2007, 14:28
Just be aware that the people who work on the coal face view excessive safety features with suspicion. the feeling is very often ANY automated safety feature will one day function faultily at the wrong place and time. Automated gear lowering? It's going to go off in the cruise one day. I'd like to see someone try and 'not notice' gear warnings going off. You may want to do a wheels up landing- so you have imposed an additional function in at a time of high emergency workload. Automated departure procedures? Already happening through FMS and autopilot- you may be imposing an additional level of automation between the pilot and the aeroplane. Not many departure procedures are flown to completion, so is it as easy for the pilot to take over and influence? Aural automated taxi instructions? Listen to all that and monitor JFK or LAX ground movement frequency? Visual instructions? Try and read an airport map, not hit taxi edge lights, listen to the radio and watch where you're going AND look at an arrow screen image Left/Right/Stop? Oh yes? What about half left, double back etc.? Then think of all the airports that can't install such technology. If they can't all have it- what's the point? Think again!

You show an undue respect for automated monitoring and function when adequate warning systems are better. How many wheels up landings have there been when warning systems are installed and functioning? All these ideas may sound ingenious- they are not practical and the people who work it know it.

flyboyike
31st May 2007, 15:48
Some early Piper Arrows came with auto gear deployment. The system has been disabled on most of them.

safetypee
31st May 2007, 21:06
"Are Mr boeing/airbus already thinking of stuff like this???"
Yes. Airbus presented their early thought on auto EGPWS pull up in 2004, I believe that they have now conducted flight tests. Boeing have investigated something similar, but based on avoiding buildings – obvious reasons, even if illogical. Some evidence for the need for auto pull up is here: Celebrating TAWS ‘Saves’: But lessons still to be learnt. (www.icao.int/fsix/_Library%5CTAWS%20Saves%20plus%20add.pdf)

There are strong arguments for auto manoeuvre for those ‘Red’ warnings that require an urgent crew response – EGPWS, ACAS, Windshear. The aircraft should commence an automatic manoeuvre if a timely response is not forthcoming. The crew should be able to override the automatic function, but I doubt if many would. There are many positive safety benefits, the current alerting systems are sufficiently reliable that nuisance alerts can be discounted; anyway the crew would not be in a position to determine that in the timescales available.

Re taxi and runway incursions, some airports have a selectable centreline lighting system (green) that guides individual aircraft to the stand; however, even with red stop bars some pilots miss the cue or fail to obey the command.

The problem you are attempting to solve involves human error, thus you may wish to look at the many problems due to error in aviation, assess the most critical issues (time / effect / outcome), then consider possible solutions.

ICT_SLB
1st Jun 2007, 01:47
Downwind,
The majority of your ideas have already been tested. Try googling T-NASA for the HUD-based taxi aid (the target is to allow taxi speeds to remain the same in fog as it is normally) and a lot of newer biz-jets have IFIS which can give you an "own ship" location & heading on geographically oriented electronic charts.

One aspect of the FAA's new AC90-101 Special Approach And Aircrew Requirements (SAAAR) is for coupled go-arounds so that the aircraft continues within a very narrow flight path - not sure that would square with automatic gear deployment.

stilton
1st Jun 2007, 03:04
I do not agree with further automation to 'keep us out of trouble'

However 'coupled go arounds' are a fact of life and are available on most modern aircraft certainly including the 75/67 that I fly !

Loose rivets
1st Jun 2007, 04:05
Not so very long ago I overrode the GPWS and maintained altitude. With the copilot's protestations ringing in one ear, and the famous "Shuddup Gringo" ringing in the other, I made what I still believe was the right decision.

It was my call, and not the computerized calculation of a black box, that kept that aircraft from climbing into an almost contiguous string of inbounds...with not the slightest hope of getting a word into the saturated APP frequency.

Command has to come from humans or black boxes, not an amalgam of the two.

Dream Land
1st Jun 2007, 04:10
1. No thanks.

2. Not needed.

3. NO

4. Prefer taxi route flush lighting, HUD, download, sounds complicated.

alexban
1st Jun 2007, 17:59
1. There are stii spurious calls from the gpws ,for ex due to terrain data from the egpws...if in visual conditions the pilot can take those as advisory . There is no fault proof system yet.The pilot should have final authority with all available help from the warning system .
Don't think the automation is the answer for all our problems.There are some very interesting articles about automation induced problems.
2 . How many belly landings on commercial aircraft do you know of? Would the system justify it's cost? Also ,I can tell you the ldg gear horn it's quite loud :hmm:
3. If that would be available why the need for pilots? Just to comfort the pax?
Just get in the plane ,close the door and push the button. We call those elevators..;)
4. There is a taxi aid system ,on Boeing it is on the moving map on the EFB.You must have in mind that on the airliners you may not be able to install the last thing on the market ,as those new gadgets must be tested very indeep before being put on the plane. Also must justify costs,as clients are looking for a good deal also. Just compare an airbus or a boeing with some of the last bussines jets on the market.

alf5071h
2nd Jun 2007, 00:12
The problem is human error - (safetypee); downwind wishes to see if automation would provide a solution, or at least an alleviation to this age-old problem and major contributor to aviation accidents.
Dream Land appears to be infallible, will never make an error: – I recall that the first and most important aspect of TEM is to accept that everyone makes errors, that error is normal, part of everyday life.
Other arguments against automation cite not being in control or nuisance warnings; yet balancing these concerns are our everyday use of autos for en-route navigation, landing, go-around and generally bailing the crew out when things get difficult. Many lives have been saved by the modern warning systems – EGPWS, ACAS, etc.
Why should we be concerned by the proposed use of an automatic function to save our life?
Is it because autos would identify our error (blame), we lose face; but we are currently exposed to these aspects with warning systems and FDRs.
Why be concerned by the perceived reliability. Cat 3 autolands provide 10-9 probability against a fatal accident and EGPWS is several magnitudes more reliable that the old GPWS. We believe in, and use these systems every day.
Do we fear the consequences of the manoeuvre e.g. ACAS manoeuvres toward another aircraft. To answer this we should look at the probabilities and thus assess the risks of these issues against the likely number of occasions that automation is used. The proposal might only be to fly automatically if the human fails; in most operations the human reacts correctly (and does not endanger other aircraft, stall, etc, etc). Thus the use of autos for those high risk events where human error can lead quickly to a fatal result would be a great benefit.
downwind I suggest that you identify the high risk operations (human failure leads quickly to a fatal accident) and also consider cost effectiveness (perhaps why so many ideas has been tried but are not yet in service).
Why are pilots so sceptical – it’s human, we fear the unknown and we think that we need to be hands-on to be in control (not the same as being in command). What we actually need to do is think about the issues, gain a greater understanding of the technology, the risks and the technical facts.
Thinking involves control of the mind. Controlling the mind controls the situation, which is a critical in-flight parameter; but what if we miss-asses the situation. I would prefer automation to help out – man and machine – teamwork.

Dream Land
2nd Jun 2007, 05:02
Alf, prior to entering the airline industry I flew thousands of safe hours on aircraft without the mentioned technology, I feel you need to look more closely at the cost/benefit aspect, what about anti-missile defense, etc., etc. Don't jump to conclusions. :=

werbil
2nd Jun 2007, 11:47
I remember the automatic extension system on the Piper Arrow from my commercial training. One of my prestart procedures was to disable the system.:ok: The last thing I ever wanted if the fan stopped was for the gear to drop, :eek: particularly just after take off. The flashing amber warning light with the overide engaged was a bit distracting though.:ugh:

Automatic gear extension would certainly make ditching interesting. :=

alf5071h
10th Jun 2007, 13:29
DL my conclusion on your view was based on what was written; my error was not qualifying it as such or leaving other possibilities open.
Your previous experiences (like mine) suggest that the operating environments that we faced tolerated greater error or enabled timely detection of hazardous situations than they do today.
Using this view to looking ahead would be too restrictive and perhaps fail to appreciate how quickly the industry is changing. For this point I include changes in individual’s attitudes and training as well as the environment and potential hazards. Furthermore, within these new hazards I include errors originating from the inappropriate implementation of technology and automated systems.

The cost / benefit aspects are more likely to be driven by the public perception of safety than any cost / safety benefit alone. We are a very safe industry, but expanding. Thus, even with a constant accident rate the number of accidents will increase. If the public view becomes the dominant driver for change, then every opportunity to reduce the accident rate has to be considered.
One alternative is to consider more training to alleviate human error, but according to the experts this is unlikely to succeed, either in changing human susceptibility or within the cost of training everyone to a very high standard.
Another view is to change the environment in which we work, reduce the opportunity for error. In many critical environments we have already implemented ‘information’ defences e.g. EGPWS, ACAS. We have seen major advances in CFIT reduction with GPWS and EGPWS (mid air with ACAS), but now there is evidence that on rare occasions human error (complacency, misjudgement, lack of knowledge) is eroding this new found safety margin. Consider how the industry might react to the first CFIT involving EGPWS – it will happen, but if that moment can be pushed to a future date by fitting an automatic pull up then there is benefit.

On balance, I think that a well-considered implementation of automatic systems could benefit safety.
However, I would accept that the assumptions about an expanding industry may not hold; consider the effect of 9/11, then what if fuel prices spiral upwards, the ‘green’ public perception overtakes the necessity to travel?

One ‘think tank’ session in my old job was to consider removal of flight deck windows or reducing the crew complement; this would be an ‘unacceptable’ proposal to the average pilot, but not impossible if driven by cost at some future date. Remember the days when no-one would contemplate driverless trains, now ask passengers going to LCY what they think … trains OK, but not planes … yet.

nano404
11th Jun 2007, 13:54
4. To prevent taxi and runway incursions the flight crew could have the HUD display hooked up to a ground based moving map display and when the aircraft requests start and pushback ATC, would download the taxi route and runway destination into the moving map and the pilots will follow this via their HUD’s. When the aircraft gets to an intersection, hold etc… a voice would tell them to turn left/right/stop/caution/you are at the destination runway.

Not all airports will possess the capabilities. Maybe a screen with a map of the taxiways of the aerodrome that it is currently at where you can select the taxiway you are cleared to use, shows your current position and all the moving aircraft in the vicinity. Not sure how plausible that is but it sounds more "do-able" than that HUD stuff.

old,not bold
11th Jun 2007, 18:23
will one day function faultily at the wrong place and time.

What we non-technopersons, bruised by experience and unhampered by blind faith in statistics and commonsense, call "Murphy's law". n'est-ce pas, named for an engineer called Murphy, somewhere in the USA, who was found to have an uncanny ability to do something wrongly if there was a way of doing it wrongly, no matter how difficult it was to do it wrongly.

Now simply stated as "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong" to which many of us add "when you least expect it", although that bit is uncorroborated by hard evidence, unlike the law itself.

"Function faultily at the wrong time and place" is very good and succinct, but I prefer the wider scope of the original Law.

Ashling
12th Jun 2007, 06:50
I'd start with an auto stow system for the speedbrakes when you initiate a terrain pull up or windshear avoidance. Lack of it combined with pilot error has cost a-lot of lives already.

As long as the crew can override said auto features some of them may contribute to safety. Can you imagine though, just diverted, approaching final reserve fuel, finals to rwy, good visual and you get a spurious pull up and cannot overide it. Large pitch up angle, pumps uncovered, engines max chat, flame out, crash, die.