Go Back  Airline Pilot Central Forums > Airline Pilot Forums > Cargo
Unmanned Cargo Aircraft?? >

Unmanned Cargo Aircraft??

Notices
Cargo Part 121 cargo airlines

Unmanned Cargo Aircraft??

Old 04-25-2017, 03:45 AM
  #91  
Banned
 
Joined APC: Feb 2017
Posts: 2,275
Default

Originally Posted by 360nki View Post
thanks for enlightening us, maybe you could be a bit more open of some of the reasons against
Well, lets see... Fewer pilots needed, erases any leverage we have, reduced pay, furloughs, basically the destruction of our livlihoods, and ability to provide for our families. Every CEO, in every industry is trying their best to reduce the need for enployees. The killing off of the middle class.
No Land 3 is offline  
Old 04-25-2017, 06:18 AM
  #92  
Gets Weekends Off
 
tomgoodman's Avatar
 
Joined APC: Feb 2006
Position: 767A (Ret)
Posts: 6,248
Default No bucks, no Buck Robot

Originally Posted by No Land 3 View Post
Well, lets see... Fewer pilots needed, erases any leverage we have, reduced pay, furloughs, basically the destruction of our livlihoods, and ability to provide for our families. Every CEO, in every industry is trying their best to reduce the need for enployees. The killing off of the middle class.
Those are good reasons for Pilot opposition, but Management also has a big reason against it: costs too much too soon and pays off too little too late. No CEO wants to damage his own bottom line to benefit that of a successor (who might be the one responsible for ousting said CEO from his job).
tomgoodman is offline  
Old 04-26-2017, 03:30 PM
  #93  
On Reserve
 
Joined APC: Mar 2017
Posts: 18
Default

Originally Posted by No Land 3 View Post
Well, lets see... Fewer pilots needed, erases any leverage we have, reduced pay, furloughs, basically the destruction of our livlihoods, and ability to provide for our families. Every CEO, in every industry is trying their best to reduce the need for enployees. The killing off of the middle class.
oh i see you cant be open to any reason against.Its not as clear cut as you make it out to be.
360nki is offline  
Old 04-26-2017, 03:51 PM
  #94  
Banned
 
Joined APC: Feb 2017
Posts: 2,275
Default

Originally Posted by 360nki View Post
oh i see you cant be open to any reason against.Its not as clear cut as you make it out to be.
If I can cut holes in the reasons against it, you better believe the people behind doing this can do a much better job of it. I am not the enemy.
No Land 3 is offline  
Old 04-26-2017, 06:12 PM
  #95  
On Reserve
 
Joined APC: Mar 2017
Posts: 18
Default

Originally Posted by No Land 3 View Post
If I can cut holes in the reasons against it, you better believe the people behind doing this can do a much better job of it. I am not the enemy.
Holes can be cut on both sides of the argument. Anyway all the best, hope your predictions on the matter don't come to affect you and others
360nki is offline  
Old 04-26-2017, 07:15 PM
  #96  
Gets Weekends Off
 
Flyguy4723's Avatar
 
Joined APC: Jan 2016
Posts: 149
Default

Doctors, lawyers and financial analysts are just as succepptable to this as a pilot. I guess it's Armageddon for the entire work force then...
Flyguy4723 is offline  
Old 04-26-2017, 07:42 PM
  #97  
Gets Weekends Off
 
PurpleToolBox's Avatar
 
Joined APC: Apr 2013
Posts: 1,621
Default

Originally Posted by No Land 3 View Post
Even that could be addressed by a logic ladder system, quicker than a human could do. Did one of the A/C buses go crazy?
I think there are several technical challenges that must be solved before airlines or even cargo freighters go pilotless and fly in the same airspace with the rest of us over populated areas.

1. See and Avoid. The sensors aren't there. On my current airplane we have the best weather radar you can buy for an airliner and still it can be fooled or attenuated. Whereas, the CA and I visually see some clouds and determine "no it's not safe to fly thru there."

Do we have systems that can anticipate problems? For example, I'm landing on a runway, an airplane is approaching a hold short rather fast, and I see that the airplane isn't stopping and I initiate a go-around. If it is possible, why don't we have it today to prevent runway incursions?

2. Compound Emergencies. Qantas Flight 32 suffered an engine failure which generated over 100 ECAM messages! A logic ladder system? Really? There's no way a programmer is going to be able to think of every possible scenario and all of its variables to be able to prioritize checklists and decision making. The Qantas crew had decades of experience and they used it to determine what was the correct next step or decision to be made. There's no way a programmer can possibly program something this complex and all of the different scenarios, variables, or outcomes.

Another example, in a recent LOE simulator event, we were presented with a seemingly simple problem. We had two EICAS checklists to run. The problem, both checklists conflicted with one another. We had to use our best judgement as to which checklist we were going to override and which one we would execute.

3. Computer/Signal Hacking. The USAF has lost HUNDREDS of drones. Their reliability is shocking. No way could you accept that for commercial aviation, manned or unmanned. But that's ok because we don't have humans on them and we're flying them mostly in very sterile airspace over war zones.

However, the hacking, jamming, and spoofing of navigation systems or datalinks can be done with cheap commercially available products. This is a huge vulnerability and it has not been solved. Anything is hackable. The question is are we going to allow potentially hundreds of these UAVs get airborne with the possibility of being jammed (or whatever) and they fallback on whatever the programmer programmed in such an event? Could we plan for something like that?

4. Risk versus Reward. Right now it is simply too expensive with a lot of risk to do pilotless airplanes. Until some of these major issues are solved and preventable, it just can't happen anytime soon.

The only way it will happen sooner is if some billionaire or major corporation is able to buy off Congress and bypass safety system redundancies and regulations written in decades of blood shed by aviators who died on the job.
PurpleToolBox is offline  
Old 04-26-2017, 07:47 PM
  #98  
Gets Weekends Off
 
Spike from flyi's Avatar
 
Joined APC: Apr 2006
Position: B777; Left Seat.
Posts: 253
Default

Don't you think that creating a pilotless surface vessel would be easier? Why is no one looking into that?

I have extensive experience with unmanned aircraft (policy) in the Department of Defense, and liaison with the FAA, and I can assure you, this is not even close to happening.

Ask yourself why we don't have single engine freighters.

This is a fantasy of cargo operators who don't view pilots as human beings, and begrudge them every nickel they pay them.
Spike from flyi is offline  
Old 04-26-2017, 08:14 PM
  #99  
Banned
 
Joined APC: Feb 2007
Posts: 461
Default

Originally Posted by Spike from flyi View Post
Don't you think that creating a pilotless surface vessel would be easier? Why is no one looking into that?

I have extensive experience with unmanned aircraft (policy) in the Department of Defense, and liaison with the FAA, and I can assure you, this is not even close to happening.

Ask yourself why we don't have single engine freighters.

This is a fantasy of cargo operators who don't view pilots as human beings, and begrudge them every nickel they pay them.
There are unmanned surface vehicles.

And there are single engine freighters. (ship and airplane)

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not.
CrimsonEclipse is offline  
Old 04-26-2017, 10:29 PM
  #100  
Line Holder
 
Joined APC: Feb 2015
Position: FO
Posts: 36
Default

Originally Posted by CrimsonEclipse View Post
There are unmanned surface vehicles.

And there are single engine freighters. (ship and airplane)

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not.
Of course there are unmanned surface vehicles. My roomba is one of them. I think PTB's point was that the environment of 121 ops is too complex for the unmanned technology that exists at the moment.

If you've ever witnessed USAF unmanned ops, you'll recognize the argument behind his first statement ("several technical challenges that must be solved before airlines or cargo freighters fly in the same airspace with the rest of us"). The USAF is as-good-or-better at remotely piloted ops than anyone else out there. That said, when they launch or recover a SINGLE RPA it closes down the associated runway for 15-20 mins. Imagine that happening at an LAX or JFK...it would be a disaster. So the first challenge to solve is that one...namely we either:
A) Build a totally separate infrastructure of airports exclusively for RPA's to operate in, or
B) Somehow get much, much better at the launch and recovery than the AF has been able to do in 15 years.

Assuming we can solve that problem, PTB's next few points deal with the complexity of non-normals, or EP's...whatever you want to call them. Many flying training organizations teach a set of heuristics (rules of thumb) to deal with EP's. The one I learned was:
1) Maintain Aircraft Control
2) Analyze the Situation
3) Take the Appropriate Action
4) Land as soon as Conditions Permit

another common one is:
Aviate, Navigate, Communicate

Sets of rules like this work great for a human mind, because it has the adaptability to take a simple rule (like maintain aircraft control) and, with some training, quickly reach a solution that generally yields a safe outcome. But lets stop to think about how you would program something as simple as "Aviate" in a procedural programming language.

Function AVIATE
- Inputs: airspeed, altitude (MSL and AGL), attitude, heading, AOA, Thrust setting, G load, flight control configuration
- Output: Primary and Secondary flight control inputs, Thrust commands

Big picture...what procedural commands do you program? Lets try..."Maintain course, altitude, and speed".

What if the current course and speed is 2000 fpm down at 500' AGL? What if the current course and speed is 20 deg NH at FL 350 with airspeed rapidly decreasing? So maybe we program something like "Don't hit the ground, don't stall, otherwise maintain course and speed".

What if we're flying in the vicinity of tallish mountains, and we don't have adequate terrain clearance 20 miles ahead on our current course and speed? Should be covered by our previous command: "Don't hit the ground". But how? Climb to get over it? What if we've lost an engine? "Fly the single engine departure procedure". What if there isn't one at this airport for some reason. Should we turn left or right?

But even assuming we can program "Don't hit the ground, don't stall, don't fly into a mountain, otherwise maintain course and speed"...this isn't always the right answer. What if a non-normal happens on final approach? Sometimes the right answer is to Go-Around...sometimes the right answer is to land. If I was teaching a human, I'd tell him "If on final with an EP, and able to make a safe landing, then continue, land, and figure it out on the ground." But what if (as PTB was implying) the non-normal is the proverbial bus full of nun's pulling onto the runway. If the runway is long enough, you can probably make a safe landing beyond the bus, but is this what we want to program? Maybe so, if we also have a second non-normal...like Cargo Fire. The point is the procedural code for this would be outrageous...

if Bus Full of Nuns = TRUE & Cargo Fire = FALSE
-- Thrust = GA, Pitch = 15 NH
else if Bus Full of Nuns = TRUE & Cargo Fire = TRUE
-- Land the airplane beyond the nuns
else Bus Full of Nuns = FALSE
-- Land the airplane normally

Maybe I have an overly simplistic view of the limits of programming at present, if so I apologize. But I still think his point is valid: Trying to build and test systems that can operate in the 121 environment at the level of safety and reliability required, without human oversight is (right now) not possible.
Sled is offline  
Related Topics
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
EZBW
United
131
05-04-2017 08:19 PM
Golden Bear
Engineers & Technicians
8
04-29-2017 12:30 PM
RealityCheck
Safety
70
08-18-2013 04:04 PM
APC225
United
13
05-29-2012 10:35 AM
KnightFlyer
Cargo
49
10-11-2007 01:14 PM

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are On
Pingbacks are On
Refbacks are On


Thread Tools
Search this Thread
Your Privacy Choices