My two-penneth:
1. The original post says "see and avoid" quite clearly and not "sense and avoid".
2. The average human reaction time to
expected stimulous is roughly 1/2 a second. For
unexpected it is closer to 2 seconds. Isn't that the latency time in worst case?
3. The US Border Protection Agency are flying Predator B, right now, in US Civil Airspace. Also NASA operate Predator B "IKHANA". They are both civil registered and operated.
4. The Boeing 747-400 has a Cat 3 autoland (allowing approaches in less than 600 metres and a crosswind of 25kts), auto braking and auto spoilers/thrust reversers. Surely the next step is to remove the man wiating to disengage it from the cockpit and put them in a control cabin? Especially for cargo/freight aircraft?
5. Finally, there are more unmanned aircraft programs in the world than manned - surely we can't all be getting it wrong???
PS. 6. Here is the crash I think he is referring to:
1 of Two RAF Reaper UAVs Crashes in Afghanistan - Defense News . It says "the MoD said the vehicle 'made a forced landing whilst on an operation over a remote unpopulated area of southern Afghanistan'."