Pilotless aircraft, a possibility to stop further attacks in the future?

[SuperTed]

How likely do you think it is that in the near future i.e 15 years from now we will be getting on board pilotless aircraft which are controlled from the ground. Will airbus use this as an 'excuss' to get rid of pilots flying their airbuses, or airlines cutting expenses and doing away with hundreds/thousands of sometimes greedy pilots.

Would the prospect of a terrorist- free flight be enough to finially convince people to get on board one of these aircraft?

Does it all mean that our hard work and huge amounts of money are all wasted (if you are under 40 that is)!!

What do you think??

[ScottishSteve]

As some of us have experienced, Airbus do a good job keeping pilots out of the loop anyway, and when we are allowed to do something the bloody thing calls us a "Retard"

Superted, would you get on a bus with no driver? I know i wouldn't and although the era of 'one man flight crew' may come, there should never even be a thought of remote-controlled Aircraft-anyway signals can be jammed/wires cut and if say some massive complex was controlling all these aircraft and IT was blown up, there'd be a helluva lot more deaths than necessary!

Cheers,

Steve

[foghorn]

It could be like the DLR in London - where the trains are automatic but can be overridden and driven manually in emergencies.

Many ticket collectors are trained as drivers (but no doubt only paid as ticket collectors). The front passenger seats of the train have a cupboard in front of them which the ticket collectors can unlock to reveal the controls.

Maybe it's the new Ryanair model? Downgrade the pilots to senior cabin attendant(emergency pilot) grade, put the controls in a lockable cupboard and give the front row passengers a fabulous view.

Still, it may not be all bad - the DLR ticket collectors get bored and drive the trains manually all the time, especially outside office hours when the bosses aren't looking.

[ 08 November 2001: Message edited by: foghorn ]

[Al Titude]

There's no way I would get on an aircraft without a pilot! Think how often even the most simple bit of kit goes u/s - it would be a braver person than I who puts all their faith in a fully automated flight!

As for the 'computerised' train arguments, if one of these loses power, or its systems fail, it safely grinds to a halt on its tracks and the pax can climb out. Not so at 35000'!!

[charles_auty]

I'm glad someone has brought up this question. I have recently been asking around my friends/work colleagues and the general concensus seems to be that they would not get on an aircraft that was remote controlled. This pleases me as I am mid way through spending the best part of £40000 on training to fly them around! I wonder if there will ever be a poll asking the same question? If people agreed the threat of hijack was worse than the threat of the a/c going wrong somehow do you think that the a/c manufacturers would start developing in this field? If everyone on PPRuNe asked around their friendship group and left results here I would be very interested in the results!

Cheers.

[DB6]

Great, so the terrorists just break into the ground control centre and remotely fly all the aircraft under control there into various edifices. Some solution.

[fionan]

Well said DB6. I am slightly disturbed that it took 6 posts before the obvious increased terrorist risk was pointed out. ;) ;) ;)

[SuperTed]

Ground stations would not be as much of a hijack threat as you may think. Systems could be flexible that allow one station to take over if there was a problem. There could be a few ground stations throughout the UK which would be well guarded.

You criticise ground stations for being a threat, but look at control towers at airports- have terrorists ever tried to take control of one of these? Only on Diehard 2 :D ! So what is the difference??

If I posted the same thing in the 1950s about navigators instead of pilots the same things would have been said. Who would have thought that IRS and laser gyros would evolve to make them redundant!

We already put our faith into fly by wire systems whereby like said the pilot is sometimes outside the loop. This is just a step further.

Cargo aircraft could first be shown to be safe using this system before the public were to use it. This is not such a crazy idea. Look at the space programme. The space shuttle is not flown by the astronauts but from ground control- the astronauts just press the right switches at the right times!!

[E-Fizz]

There's still a human pilot in the Space shuttles left hand seat though ...

[DB6]

There are points for and against, Superted, but I don't think the terrorist threat is a 'for'. As for control towers, the difference is they have no direct control over aircraft, so if an aircraft commander receives ATC directions that will put his aircraft in danger he will say 'Major Tom to ground control, sod off.'