Originally Posted by gobnu
I was just wondering, for someone who hopefully has at least 20 years left, what the odds were of cargo going single pilot in that time frame and freezing the movement for the foreseable future?
I'm at UPS but in my mid-30s, and am not remotely concerned about that impacting my career.
Airlines like FDX (and UPS) are buying billions of dollars of airframes that are already a generation old, that are not designed to be operated by a single pilot, will not be easily or cheaply converted to a single-pilot cockpit and will not be easily or cheaply converted for the required remote-pilot backup.
Datalink is not robust, secure, or inexpensive enough for a remote-pilot backup - even in military applications which has a much larger budget.
Not even the military, with the oft-discussed "pilot shortage", is actively and loudly working toward single-pilot tankers or transports.
From a regulatory perspective, all non-military single pilot jets today currently are certified under Part 23...not Part 25, and while there's plenty of media discussion about "research" no proposed Part 25 aircraft are being designed with single-pilot operation in mind - even bizjets, where operating regulations are more relaxed than 121.
Think of how long it takes the FAA to do practically
anything - even approving iPads for 121 navigational charts took years.
You'd also have to have politician buy-in on this, and especially in light of the Atlas 767 crash and 737 MAX issues have a hard time thinking they'd want single-pilot widebodies over their constituents...even if its "only" cargo.
Those technologies are slowly marching this way, and will almost certainly come to cargo first...but in the next two decades? Doubt it...
My $0.02, worth exactly what you paid for it...YMMV, caveat emptor, etc.