Originally Posted by
Nantonaku
Look at the drone loss rate, I agree this will happen but not soon. How long did it take the FAA to approve replacing one book in an aircraft with an iPad? Yeah, multiple that by 50, no one reading this thread will be alive when passenger airliners fly without pilots in the cockpit.
They are not drones, they still require a human on board, however, it is no longer a profession that requires more than two weeks of training. There is still a pilot up front, you would have to have one to prevent hacking. The aircraft would still require manual flight path programming, just the autopilot takes the aircraft from gate to gate, there is no longer any instrument procedures, or ATC, every plane goes direct to destination. Since machine vision can see and avoid wake turbulence, there is no longer separation requirements. The aircraft automatically time, and space each other.