Originally Posted by
The Duke
I'm not in favor of a single-pilot flightdeck for the reasons you've all specified. Personally, I love flying w/ someone else, usually makes the job a lot of fun and less stressful. My only concern is that advancements that we're seeing w/ the military, specifically drone aircraft, will eventually find their way to the flightdecks of commercial airlines. Wasn't GPS started by our military...now we're using GPS. The military gave us the internet (Sorry Al), now we're using the internet.
It's just a hypothetical, but if the military can now launch remotely controlled 24 hr. drone missions in the middle-east, wouldn't it be possible to apply this to commercial aviation? Cost may dictate that this is at least considered/tried in order to allow for much of the American public to continue to afford commercial flying. Again, I'm opposed to the idea, but don't think for a second that there are others who have not given all of this some serious thought.
Yes! What about a single pilot airliner that is also tied into a remote 'drone type' operating system on the ground. A dispatcher/remote pilot will collaborate with the airborne crew-member and in an emergency take control remotely with drone technology. That gives back an element of redundancy. This remote dispatcher/pilot can monitor several airborne flights at once that have staggered departure/arrival times thereby eliminating the payroll costs of say 5 Co-pilots. Or worse, the remote ground operator IS the Captain, and the airborne pilot is the FO.
