Unmanned aircrafts
Unmanned aircrafts
(OP)
Unmanned aircrafts are being more and more used for military purposes will be unmanned aircraft technology be used on civil transportation such as commercial cargos or passenger planes?
would you fly in an Unmanned aircraft?
would you fly in an Unmanned aircraft?





RE: Unmanned aircrafts
The advantage to military ROVs is that the pilots are not put at risk and there are design advantages conferred by not having to accommodate a pilot on the aircraft.
There is no advantage to an ROV for a commercial airliner.
Also recognize that the pilot's union is very strong and very wealthy and would fight any move in that direction; it's unlikely that you could ever get the FAA to buy off on it even if it were a good idea.
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RE: Unmanned aircrafts
That being said, I agree with Beggar. There would be a lot of oposition from not only the pilot's union but from the public as well. It's an interesting dream though.
David
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."
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RE: Unmanned aircrafts
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
As noted for most of the flight the pilots aren't flying the aircraft anyway, it's on some kind of auto pilot. Also arguably with the fly by wire aircraft even when he's moving the stick the pilot isn't 'flying' the A/C.
When FBW was originally proposed for passenger A/C I believe there were objections. Given that these were overcome maybe we will see remotely piloted commercial A/C sooner rather than we imagine.
As regards flying a plane re computer games. I find driving a real car or flying a real plane easier than most games or even some simulators, but maybe that's just me.
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
I don't know how long it will take but I'm sure that we'll see unmanned passenger flights eventually, pretty sure we'll also get unmanned vehicular traffic with loads of jokes about the awful old days when you had to actively driver yourself.
In the shorter-term, as has been said auto-pilots already do a large amount of work, particularly inbetween landing and take-off. I think scotty7 has it exactly right though when he says that the pilot proves his worth when things do go wrong.
I've changed my mind from my first sentence - is there any economic reason to get rid of pilots? For the military it makes sense, lives are on the line every flight, for commercial I can't see that the pilot's salary makes that much difference to the bottom line of a given flight. Does it?
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
David
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
You can't "feel" the aircraft in a simulator. When you're approach weather, even though an auto-pilot maintains aircraft stability, the pilot still can feel the turbulence, and can feel the effect weather is having on the airplane. A pilot can feel that it's a little bumpy at this altitude so request an altitude change.
What happens if the airplane is on auto-pilot, executing a GPS based approach and while on final, there is outside electronic signal interference? There may be nothing wrong with the GPS satelites, nor with the onboard equipment, but if the signal is broken, then what?
I would also be concerned about the ability to handle aircraft emergencies, not just in your aircraft, but in response to emergencies is nearby aircraft that require you to go into holding patterns, or even execute a missed approach.
I'm confident that the technology can do things just fine, and perhaps even better, under normal situations. But how well can the technology react to the unforseen situations.
Good Luck
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RE: Unmanned aircrafts
Just my two cents.
Regards,
EOIT
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
That's where your system FMEA gets tested. If your software is properly written it will handle that sort of error. If not, then, not. I amgaine you'd have several layers of redundancy in the approach system. Automated landing systems existed long before GPS.
Like it or not, automated drivers are coming. You can already take a ride in a train with no driver.
Cheers
Greg Locock
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RE: Unmanned aircrafts
A ccomputer should do the exact same thing a human pilot does. Abort the landing and fly the missed approach procedure.
I agree with scotty7's statement that a human pilot is necessary when things go wrong. It would have to be a pretty sophisticated machine to be able to pick out the best place to attempt an off-airport landing. We haven't yet built a machine that can exercise that level of judgement.
I don't, however, agree with scotty7's statement about "seat of the pants" flying. Most accidents in instrument conditions are caused by pilots responding to "seat of the pants" instincts rather than relying on what the instruments say.
-b
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
The big problem is the reilability of such systems. Airbus designed their aircraft to be semi-automatic which led to a lot of crashes when the pilot needed to abort a landing and didn't reconfigure the flight mode (flip a switch). The pilot and automatic controls would fight each other resulting in a crash. One video taped example happened at a airshow in Mulhouse-Habsheim France in 1988 where a very senior Airbus test pilot was at the controls as the plane flew into a forest. Airbus has always blamed the pilots in such cases although it is really an example of bad systems design and human-factor engineering.
Just a few weeks ago, a brand new Embraer business jet collided with a brand new 737 in Brazil (each plane was less than 30 days old). Both planes were equipped with the latest in collision avoidance equipment. Neither plane had a collision warning. The Gol 737 crashed with 154 lives lost. However, the skilled Embraer pilot managed to make an emergency landing saving the seven in his badly damaged jet. Again, this was not a failure of the pilots, but of of the systems in place. It remains to be fully determined, but it looks like a failure of the air traffic control compounded by a failure of the collision avoidance equipment. I doubt an automated pilotless system could have quickly adopted to the changed flight charcteristics of the plane, and spotted a uncharted airstrip in the Amazon jungle to make a safe emergency landing. And even a automated system will still be subject to the directions of air traffic control.
Maybe they should automated air traffic control first.
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
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RE: Unmanned aircrafts
While never the biggest gamer I had been playing games including sims for a long time before I flew a real plane. The Real plane was a lot easier to land, wasn't 'easy' but in a real aircraft I have as many successful landings as take offs.
My odds on the syms I've tried aren't nearly as good! Maybe it's not just that the real plane is easier but also that your life relying on it focuses the mind somewhat as others on Eng Tips are always keen to point out.
If a military UAV has trouble at most it will just try to divert to an unpopulated/non critical area before crashing. Arguably a cargo plane could do the same thing. A passenger plane however doesn't have this option and that's where the problem lies.
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
In military flight, there are significant advantages to RPVs, a major factor being they can be significantly cheaper and smaller. A piloted aircraft on phot recon, for example, is as big and heavy as it is because of the pilot and all the safety systems around him from armour to ejector seats etc. RPVs are expendable and can risk enemy fire.
Dropping the crew from commercial flights, passenger or freight doesn't seem to provide the same level of advantages since the plane would still need to be the size it is to carry the same passengers or freight.
Technically it could be done, is it more or less risky? or is it going to be perceived as more risky? I suspect that the latter would be a transient fear.... witness the trains scenario... people are more accustomed to modern technology today than ever before.
The only question is would these be fully automated or remotely piloted? In either case I like AardvarkVW's thought about one pilot handling the landings of several different planes.... by the way, does it matter if the plane crashes because the pilot or the computer was victim of an instrument failure? The difference would be if, as Comcokid says, the pilot can make a difference in enough cases to justify his place.... if the money difference were enough then i guess that sooner or later like it or not that's what we'd get... pilotless planes. But is there enough financial advantage? Taking the pilot out would probably necessitate a significant increase in multiple redundnat systems based around different technologies (one fails the others shouldn't).
On the other hand, how many coputers would let their kids fly the plane (Russian pilot: crash wiped out all) or would have heart attacks, drink too much etc. Pilot error may often be a cop out but equally, pilot error also happens.
In the end, it probably will come down to cost.
JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
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RE: Unmanned aircrafts
Especially landing isn't always fun, not all pilots can land soft and balanced. If you really want to fly yourself, take a chessna, and make sure your passengers have life-insurance.
IJsbrand
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
interesting link.
But, all they really did was fly a large old remote controlled plane which we all know has been done before, the pilot was on board but in the back and there was an emergency crew in the cockpit just in case.
This was a test of military technology and really doesn't address the issue of remotely piloted or fully automatic passenger/freight aircraft. I don't think there is a technology issue of any magnitude just one of financial advantage and getting the public to swallow it and we all know the public will ultimately do waht is expected of them.
JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
I'd disagree to a point. There are technical issues.
At the moment I don't believe UAVs are 'smart enough' to adequately deal with emergencies if they have passengers on board.
As I said before this isn't a major issue for Military UAV, they at most find somewhere 'safe' to crash. For a vehicle with passengers on board this probably wouldn't be considered adequate.
There is a lot more decision making involved when you have to try and get the A/C to the ground relatively safely, at least to minimize harm to the passengers, than just flying around the sky.
To give you some idea the last I heard DARPA was still sponsoring races of unmanned vehicles across the Mojave Desert. This involves more decision making/is more complex than flying around the relatively empty sky. To the best of my knowledge none of the entries has ever finished the course.
I guess a remote human pilot could take over in emergencies but first you’ve got to give him adequate situational awareness to handle the emergency (difficult with current technology) and second you’ve got to make sure his link to the A/C is secure (difficult to guarantee).
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
So no I will never fly in an unmanned A/C, and nor will anyone else
However, to really answer the OP yes I think much of the technology will eventually be applied to Cargo and Passenger A/C.
With the current state of technology I don't think I'd fly on an Aircraft that didn't have an onboard pilot to oversea things.
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
If the most important piece of onboard safety equipment (flight attendants) were a pilot to the extent that they could execute or assist emergency landings, maybe it could happen.
The ROI on RPVs is realized in the crew cost savings.
RPVs could be harder to hijack, although hijackings aren’t statistically as relevant as accidents.
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
Now UAV's taking higher risk mission profiles is great but really, being able to eliminate up to 1/3 of the weight and size needed to support the human part of the plane greatly helps cost and other factors such as stealth and range or endurance.
Onto the other point,
I don't see totally pilot-less or remote pilot commercial plane anywhere soon in the future. My two reasons are, first the computer can not yet be programmed with a sense of self-preservation, responsibility problem solving that people have.
My other reason is that every ship needs a captain, going down to one pilot/captain per flight and and auto-pilot I could see, but you still want a trained person with an understanding of the entire craft and flying to oversee its operation from on board, as well as direct the crew. A flight attendant with a pilots license isn't enough in my opinion.
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
I work with some great Technical Pilots though. They are our liason with the operations side and they are very sharp too.
You might be surprised at some of the things an average line pilot says though.
I do know of an airline Avionics Engineering Manager for a very well known major airline (former employer) that bragged to us, that he had assured the company VPs that he would do everything in his power to get "those guys" out of the cockpits as soon as possible.
Certainly over the top for today, but it's true.
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
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RE: Unmanned aircrafts
but then i also wish they'd kept mechanical flight controls.
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
1) Military UAVs get rid of 1/3 of systems by removing the human - correct, but that won't work for passenger-carrying because the passengers will still need heat, pressurised air, light, windows etc.
2) Removing the human means you don't risk losing the guy you've spent millions of pounds and several years training - I hope that the pilot of a passenger a/c will not be risking his life each time he takes off
3) Removing the human means that the military aircraft is not G-limited by the human making it more manueverable - commercial aircraft don't pull high G
4) Removing the human and putting him on the ground only moves the cost around - you would still need to pay a pilot (until the aircraft was totally autonomous)
5) In going from 2 to 1 pilot, illness happens (remember Airplane! - that's why pilots eat different meals, and on a serious note, one of the prime supected causes of a Trident crash in the UK was the pilot having a heart attack)
6) Ever heard of ALPA?
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
Scotty7
#6 - No, I have never heard of "ALPA". Please enlighten me. I am a little slow(er) on the uptake today.
Chris
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com
RE: Unmanned aircrafts
Nowadays modern oil refineries and nuclear plants have intelligent control systems and emergent shut down systems the paper of control room and outdoor operators is almost just vigilance. Redundant intelligent systems are already working in aircrafts, maybe they will not replace human presence but in the future the paper of the pilot will be mainly as a vigilant of computer information with minimal actions on the commands.
Luis