No pilot?
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I have been trying really hard to think of a situation where all flight deck and crew would "disappear".
Maybe the answer would be as silly as the question.
And albeit semantics, but the crew of the Helios were unconsious...not absent.
Maybe the answer would be as silly as the question.
And albeit semantics, but the crew of the Helios were unconsious...not absent.
Last edited by p7lot; 6th Aug 2009 at 09:34.
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Admiral, I admit that you couldn't do it in every phase of flight... 
Next will be you say that it's also not possible before take-off!
You have to be close to your destination of course. And you will overrun even with autobrake max but it will be with minimum speed. But everyone will be unharmed.
Dani
Next will be you say that it's also not possible before take-off!
You have to be close to your destination of course. And you will overrun even with autobrake max but it will be with minimum speed. But everyone will be unharmed.
Dani
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If M Oleary has wet dreams...
Well, that is the most wet of all, I am sure!
Can you imagine? You get in an airplane in the UK. You think that some UK formed remote pilot will remote fly it. OK.
But no! He is a Mumbai slave-remote-pilot formed in all forms of remote slavery, who started his career in a call centre. (At this point, M.O. is in furious R.E.M)
Well, that is the most wet of all, I am sure!
Can you imagine? You get in an airplane in the UK. You think that some UK formed remote pilot will remote fly it. OK.
But no! He is a Mumbai slave-remote-pilot formed in all forms of remote slavery, who started his career in a call centre. (At this point, M.O. is in furious R.E.M)
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Don't worry about it. All that FANS b-s that someone wrote about is totally inadequate and insufficiently reliable. To have half a chance for this to work requires failsafe dedicated & discreet datalinks for every airplane. Using FANS as it is to try to operate an airplane remotely from the ground, there'll be a crash every week due to loss of datalink. How many times have you been on CPDLC/ADS and then got "SATCOM", "SATCOM DATA", "DATALINK LOST", "DATALINK SYS"....???
For ATC comms, this is acceptable because you just revert to secondary communications. For flight control it is woefully short. Not only has the datalink got to be totally reliable from start-up to shut-down, it has to be discreet for each individual airplane flying. To control a UAV over Afghanistan by remote control from the US is a different matter as you only have a handful to worry about. Current estimates put the number of commercial airplane traffic at 30,000 plus per day - that means 30,000 plus failsafe datalinks under worst case scenarios. Anyone who thinks this is gonna happen anytime soon is engaging in wishful thinking. But then, dreaming is free....
For ATC comms, this is acceptable because you just revert to secondary communications. For flight control it is woefully short. Not only has the datalink got to be totally reliable from start-up to shut-down, it has to be discreet for each individual airplane flying. To control a UAV over Afghanistan by remote control from the US is a different matter as you only have a handful to worry about. Current estimates put the number of commercial airplane traffic at 30,000 plus per day - that means 30,000 plus failsafe datalinks under worst case scenarios. Anyone who thinks this is gonna happen anytime soon is engaging in wishful thinking. But then, dreaming is free....
Last edited by gengis; 4th Aug 2009 at 15:41.
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ad 3) I truely don't know what would happen if you lowered the gear at FL 350 doing M .80 - the doors will be gone, for sure! Then the transsonic aerodynamics - I'd say it will be interessting!
All is type depended i guess, you could use GBAS instead of ILS for example, harder to confuse the flight computers that way
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Quite a number of posts are suggesting, and going down the thought process of a data link to the a/c and some person on the ground remotely guiding/flying the a/c.
I think the real question, is it possible for (on board) software alone to control an a/c from a to b?
I think the real question, is it possible for (on board) software alone to control an a/c from a to b?
Nemo Me Impune Lacessit
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dazdaz - Possibly, but if the software for the flight was fully self contained then how would the aircraft be able to cope with en route changes? Just simple weather avoidance would be a problem, as would level changes for conflicting traffic, taking up the hold when stacking for arrival and so the list goes on.
Despite being dismissed as a factor by a previous poster I still maintain that security will always be the biggest obstacle. Lunatic terrorists taking over a ground control station, by any means, could bring unmanned aviation to a stand-still over night.
Despite being dismissed as a factor by a previous poster I still maintain that security will always be the biggest obstacle. Lunatic terrorists taking over a ground control station, by any means, could bring unmanned aviation to a stand-still over night.
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REST:
I am afraid that if they do an effort, they will overcome any obstacles, invent new systems, methods, redundancies, combined remote control and self contained systems...
Imagine an airplane that is transfered from one air traffic controller/remote pilot to another. In the event of loss of comm, TCAS will intervene. If WX ahead this can be done in a similar way.
All this research can be very expensive, let alone implementing it. But still the greedy bastards in the industry may calculate that they will have benefits in the long term, if they manage to put us out of the cockpits.
ADMIRAL346
HAHA, You mean the episode when the germans buy the nuclear plant and Homer stars dreaming of "chocolateland" in the middle of a "explain your job" interview?
hmmmm.... Chocolate!
I am afraid that if they do an effort, they will overcome any obstacles, invent new systems, methods, redundancies, combined remote control and self contained systems...
Imagine an airplane that is transfered from one air traffic controller/remote pilot to another. In the event of loss of comm, TCAS will intervene. If WX ahead this can be done in a similar way.
All this research can be very expensive, let alone implementing it. But still the greedy bastards in the industry may calculate that they will have benefits in the long term, if they manage to put us out of the cockpits.
ADMIRAL346
HAHA, You mean the episode when the germans buy the nuclear plant and Homer stars dreaming of "chocolateland" in the middle of a "explain your job" interview?
hmmmm.... Chocolate!
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REST:
I am afraid that if they do an effort, they will overcome any obstacles, invent new systems, methods, redundancies, combined remote control and self contained systems...
Imagine an airplane that is transfered from one air traffic controller/remote pilot to another. In the event of loss of comm, TCAS will intervene. If WX ahead this can be done in a similar way.
All this research can be very expensive, let alone implementing it. But still the greedy bastards in the industry may calculate that they will have benefits in the long term, if they manage to put us out of the cockpits.
I am afraid that if they do an effort, they will overcome any obstacles, invent new systems, methods, redundancies, combined remote control and self contained systems...
Imagine an airplane that is transfered from one air traffic controller/remote pilot to another. In the event of loss of comm, TCAS will intervene. If WX ahead this can be done in a similar way.
All this research can be very expensive, let alone implementing it. But still the greedy bastards in the industry may calculate that they will have benefits in the long term, if they manage to put us out of the cockpits.
Take FANS for example. This is something that has been on the cards since the early 90s - a good 15-years down the road before a workable system is in place (CNS - CPDLC/RNP/ADS...). Something that much more complicated as dedicated flight control inputs via remote control on a very large scale for that matter.... you just do the maths. Quite possibly our children might have made it to Senior Capt when it happens. Relax...
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for sure remote controlled aircrafts would have one advantage: in case of accident, a radio interference or a passenger cellphone would invariably be blamed 
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No Pilot? Answer No Me on board! Don't even like the Dockland Light Railway in London. No drivers on train,one dimension travel,about 20 mph !Managed to have 3 or 4 accidents. No way in the air!
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Microburst:
I stand corrected with the numbers. According to the link below, total worldwide traffic movements for 2007 was 73,864,874. That very roughly equates to 200,000 air traffic movements PER DAY, not 30,000 as previously postulated. Given that not all of this is commercial airline traffic, it still illustrates the number of air traffic movements concerned.
Someone brought up the point that the question should be whether the Autopilots could do the job from start-up to landing, rather than flight control from the ground via datalink. Even if it were (and it is likely that the technology to do it is not far away), that alone, IMHO, can never be adequate. Autopilots frequently require intervention - be it route modifications, weather deviations etc. Without a pilot, the only conceivable other form of control of the automatics has to be ground control via failsafe datalinks. Imagine 200,000+ per day - none of which may be allowed to drop off line for whatever reason.
One other point that is worthy of mention - it is not just "normal" flight control by datalink that needs to be taken care of; any such "automated" system will also need to handle non-normal/emergency procedures as well. Plus, in-flight decision making? Uncontrolled engine fire midway over the Pacific? Or combination of separate unrelated on-board system failures? (Don't say it can't happen - we all know that it can). If the automatics cant' handle it, or require intervention of some sort (read "help") and there is no pilot then only ground control via datalink remains. And for this very reason this has got to be 100% failsafe under worst case conditions & cannot EVER be allowed to fail. Imagine 200,000+ of these at the very least?????
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I stand corrected with the numbers. According to the link below, total worldwide traffic movements for 2007 was 73,864,874. That very roughly equates to 200,000 air traffic movements PER DAY, not 30,000 as previously postulated. Given that not all of this is commercial airline traffic, it still illustrates the number of air traffic movements concerned.
Someone brought up the point that the question should be whether the Autopilots could do the job from start-up to landing, rather than flight control from the ground via datalink. Even if it were (and it is likely that the technology to do it is not far away), that alone, IMHO, can never be adequate. Autopilots frequently require intervention - be it route modifications, weather deviations etc. Without a pilot, the only conceivable other form of control of the automatics has to be ground control via failsafe datalinks. Imagine 200,000+ per day - none of which may be allowed to drop off line for whatever reason.
One other point that is worthy of mention - it is not just "normal" flight control by datalink that needs to be taken care of; any such "automated" system will also need to handle non-normal/emergency procedures as well. Plus, in-flight decision making? Uncontrolled engine fire midway over the Pacific? Or combination of separate unrelated on-board system failures? (Don't say it can't happen - we all know that it can). If the automatics cant' handle it, or require intervention of some sort (read "help") and there is no pilot then only ground control via datalink remains. And for this very reason this has got to be 100% failsafe under worst case conditions & cannot EVER be allowed to fail. Imagine 200,000+ of these at the very least?????
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Quote:
"You clearly know absolutely nothing about the true reasons for this crash - why post stuff that you a) don't know the facts of, and b) is completely wrong?"
I conceed the youtube clip was in bad taste and has been removed.
I was trying to emphasise the consequences of pilotless flight ....
obviously in such poor taste I wear the official pprne pariah t shirt.
"You clearly know absolutely nothing about the true reasons for this crash - why post stuff that you a) don't know the facts of, and b) is completely wrong?"
I conceed the youtube clip was in bad taste and has been removed.
I was trying to emphasise the consequences of pilotless flight ....
obviously in such poor taste I wear the official pprne pariah t shirt.
Freight God
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I know that some airline bosses dream of the pilotless aircraft, mainly to avoid union discussions I suppose. From what I gather most engineers in the aircraft manufacturers are NOT hot about the idea at all. The reason is simple. While many people are very fast to cite statistics and the 'human factor' in accidents and a potential improvement in accident statistics with pilotless aircraft the manufacturers on the other hand know at least part of the statistics that is missing. They have a faint idea of how many times those by now two biological computers up front have not failed but SAVED the day. The reason why they only have a faint idea is that most of the times the saving went unreported becasue it was 'normal'.
I know it is a PPRuNe fixation that at least one manufacturer is trying to keep the pilots out of the loop, but the reality is quite different.
I know it is a PPRuNe fixation that at least one manufacturer is trying to keep the pilots out of the loop, but the reality is quite different.
Nemo Me Impune Lacessit
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gengis, I really like your reasoning and I believe it 100%, technically the pilot less aircraft is still generations away and that puts my security argument left smoldering off stage, ready to pounce when the technology problems have been solved to the extent that passengers are happy to fly on a pilot less aircraft, I personally believe it will never happen in our world.
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I'd hazard a guess that when the pilotless airliner comes out, it'll be a freighter. Once it's flown for many years with with an acceptably low amount of smoking holes in farmer's fields, the passenger one will get wheeled out.
Maybe the pilot will be replaced by an engineer.....?!!
Maybe the pilot will be replaced by an engineer.....?!!
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i don't think we will live long enough to see pilotless freighters or passenger liners.
the insurance of my 2 seater is higher than the one of my sportscar. the insurance of my 4 seater is way more than a SUV. statistically the chances that i will kill someone going down with my airplane is close to zero, while the chance i can take out some pedestrian is very high. does it make sense? not a tiny bit, but our agencies are terrified at the though of me flying a small plane, but yawn if i drive a 8 seats, 3 metric tons, 500hp SUV. i dont see any aviation authority ever certifying a liner for pilotless operation. even single pilot operation is out of the question, so far.
the insurance of my 2 seater is higher than the one of my sportscar. the insurance of my 4 seater is way more than a SUV. statistically the chances that i will kill someone going down with my airplane is close to zero, while the chance i can take out some pedestrian is very high. does it make sense? not a tiny bit, but our agencies are terrified at the though of me flying a small plane, but yawn if i drive a 8 seats, 3 metric tons, 500hp SUV. i dont see any aviation authority ever certifying a liner for pilotless operation. even single pilot operation is out of the question, so far.