Passenger plane flies 800 kilometres without a pilot

[FlightPathOBN]

The flight from Warton in Lancashire, to Inverness in Scotland by a British Aerospace Jetstream is being hailed as a milestone by members of ASTRAEA, a £62 million UK research consortium aiming to develop the technology that will allow civilian aircraft to share their airspace with drones – some of which could be as big as airliners.


Passenger plane flies 800 kilometres without a pilot (http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23521-passenger-plane-flies-800-kilometres-without-a-pilot.html)

[Capt Pit Bull]

Pretty impressive!

Just a few corrections:
- There were no passengers on board (at least, not the fee paying kind, although there were some engineers.
- The article title proclaims "without a pilot" and then goes on to tell us that there WAS a pilot on board.
- The article text tells us "A business plane has flown an 800-kilometre round trip in civilian airspace without the pilot on board operating its controls." and then goes on to tell us that the pilot handled the take off and landing.

Call me fussy, but an aircraft without passengers that has got a pilot doesn't really qualify as a passenger plane without a pilot. Especially if the pilot did the take off and landing.

[rjay259]

Isn't the global hawk almost as big as the jet stream??

[FlightPathOBN]

Cpt PB,

Concur, the article is a bit light on details...I went to the ASTRAEA webpage to get details, but nothing posted...

The important line that I read out of this was that the sortie was to test the 'detect and avoid" systems for unmanned platforms (drones). The only real way to do this is with a production aircraft.

That is really the basis of the article, but it does perhaps lead to the ATC self regulation direction...hard to tell.

"To test the system, fake objects to avoid were introduced to the flight computer" See I told you we could do this from the back! :}

[Ian W]

Isn't the global hawk almost as big as the jet stream??

Depends whether you are measuring length or wingspan or MTOW


Global Hawk:


Length: 47.6 ft (14.5 m)
Wingspan: 130.9 ft (39.9 m)
Height: 15.3 ft (4.7 m)
Empty weight: 14,950 lb (6,781 kg)
Gross weight: 32,250 lb (14,628 kg)
Powerplant: 1 × Rolls-Royce F137-RR-100 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolls-Royce_F137-RR-100) turbofan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbofan) engine, 7,600 lbf (34 kN) thrust

(From Wikipedia)


Length: 47 ft 1¾ in (14.37 m)
Wingspan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wingspan): 52 ft 0 in (15.85 m)
Height: 17 ft 5½ in (5.32 m)
Wing area: 271 ft² (25.2 m²)
Airfoil (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airfoil): NACA 63A418 at root, NACA 63A412 at tip
Empty weight (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturer%27s_Weight_Empty): 9,613 lb (4,360 kg)
Max. takeoff weight (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximum_takeoff_weight): 15,332 lb (6,950 kg)
Powerplant (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_engine): 2 × Garrett TPE331-10UG (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garrett_TPE331) turboprop (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turboprop), 940 shp (701 kW) each

(From Wikipedia)

[PappyJ]

This one went almost 1500 Kms with no pilots, and with passengers! :)

Vietnam Airlines captain to face fine for allowing model to pose in cockpit | DTiNews - Dan Tri International, the news gateway of Vietnam (http://dtinews.vn/en/news/017004/29073/vietnam-airlines-captain-to-face-fine-for-allowing-model-to-pose-in-cockpit.html)

[BARKINGMAD]

Hush, keep quiet about this or our jobs are even more in danger?!

When wee Willie and MO'L hear about it, they'll be looking at the potential economies of getting rid of those pink quivering whingeing b'stds in seats 0A & 0B who make the plane more nose heavy and therefore less fuel-efficient!

On the plus side we'll get to spend more time with our families as we queue for the food parcels..............................:=

[DaveReidUK]

I went to the ASTRAEA webpage to get details, but nothing postedGood write-up on the ASTRAEA project here:

Drones of Peace | Aerospace | The Royal Aeronautical Society (http://media.aerosociety.com/aerospace-insight/2011/09/15/drones-of-peace/5346/)

[jcjeant]

When wee Willie and MO'L hear about it, they'll be looking at the potential economies of getting rid of those pink quivering whingeing b'stds in seats 0A & 0B who make the plane more nose heavy and therefore less fuel-efficient!No pilot in the plane .. a source of savings? .. not so sure
There are no more pilots on the plane .. nice .. but there are those on the ground and they will ask some money :)
But one advantage is that when the plane crashes .. pilots will still be alive .. and may well be witnesses of choice for the investigation :ok:

[Natstrackalpha]

"Ladies and Gentlemen, good evening - your pilotless airliner has just gone into a dive!" -

"The automatic refreshment trolley will be serving fresh coffee and sandwiches"

"Terrain impact in 3.5 minutes - take you brace positions!"

"Please select one of the fluffy bunny gifts off the gift trolley - your seat number will be debited with the purchase"

"Brace-brace!"

"For a further selection of gifts from our auto-shop, please make your selection now as impact is imminent, please press the `wait` button if you require more time to make your choice"

"If you would like to browse our on board digital catalogue, please press, 2"
"If you would like - to make a special purchase, complete with home delivery, please press 3"

"5 seconds to impact!"

"If you would like to leave a comment on the auto service--------(bump

--------------------------------------"I`m sorry, here are your choices once again "For soaps and perfumes, please press 1 . .

[FlightPathOBN]

http://safr.kingfeatures.com/idn/etv/zone/xml/content.php?file=aHR0cDovL3NhZnIua2luZ2ZlYXR1cmVzLmNvbS9SaHl tZXNXaXRoT3JhbmdlLzIwMTMvMDUvUmh5bWVzX3dpdGhfT3JhbmdlLjIwMTM wNTIzXzkwMC5naWY=

[Teldorserious]

What is funny is the airline pilots of today have basically screwed themselves out of a job because since they pushed, advocated for well natured, obedient checklist readers and computer device managers, they sold the airlines on the concept that computers fly aircraft, not people.

Now, ofcourse when the lights go out and we need a pilot to fly the plane, none are on board, but that doesn't happen that often...right? Insurance will cover that..right?

So it's logical if two pilots sit on thier hands for 12 hours never touching the controls that the evolution will be a pilotless cockpit. Companies seek to get away from labour costs, at all costs.

No doubt it will move to one pilot in the cockpit with a back up on the ground, probably monitoring a few planes, which will move to no pilots in the air, the pilot on the ground monitoring more planes, to a completely automated flight, ect.

Good job! We don't need pilots...right? We need buddies and pals to work with because that's what's really important...not flying skills or experience, and certainly the passengers don't matter, right?

[BOAC]

Didn't Air India manage 40 minutes without pilots?:)

[FlightPathOBN]

Doesnt help when its pretty easy to spot an ac on a CAT III Autoland.....:{

[Natstrackalpha]

Didn't Air India manage 40 minutes without pilots?http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/src:www.pprune.org/get/images/smilies/smile.gif

Million to one guess: did somebody lock themselves out?

[Piltdown Man]

...aiming to develop the technology that will allow civilian aircraft to share their airspace with drones.

Ahem... We don't need any technology to share any of our bloody airspace with a "Johnny come lately" :mad: drone. They need the technology to share with us. They also need a great deal more so they don't bump into tall masts, ground, ships and our cities and the suchlike. Not my problem!

What is funny is the airline pilots of today have basically screwed themselves out of a job...

When your computer at home is totally reliable (including power cuts, the cat being sick on it and rogue orange juices), then we have a job. Fortunately, software is written by the cheapest people, not by the best.

I'm not going to worry yet.

[grounded27]

Ahhumm, ADS-B.

[FlightPathOBN]

ADSB means nothing..not sure what you are trying to say.

To even think about ADSB, it would require IN, and that is but a far off dream meant to spent $Millions on implementation with little chance of it happening.

[deadcut]

So lets say Fedex orders some brand new, pilotless freighter and announces 500 orders for the future.
Every single pilot in the company goes on strike. Now what?