There are a couple of good reasons why we will eventually see commercial air
transport operations using pilotless aircraft:
Firstly humans, (and predominantly pilots), caused or contributed in a big way to just about every fatal aviation accident we have suffered in recent years. There are very few fatal accidents these days but when they do happen technical reliability is such that system failure is seldom the cause - I admit that human/machine interfaces can be an issue but this is hardly the fault of the machine;
Secondly there is nothing much to stop us - we have the technology already, it just needs to be perfected and proven. The two biggest hurdles will be public opinion, egged on by its self-appointed mouthpiece the media; and the regulators, blown by the winds of political will. Otherwise we’re there…
It won't happen soon and it won’t happen overnight but it will probably begin with freighters reducing to a single pilot, backed up by a second in the rest area if required by duty time. The pilot’s health and alertness will be monitored by yet another system and the operational reliability of the aircraft will have been demonstrated to adequately allow for short ‘comfort breaks’. Eventually though you can expect to see an ‘aircraft manager’ in the cabin, with access to a few diagnostic tools but essentially responsible for looking after the walk-on cargo.
And if you doubt all this, imagine what George Stephenson would have said in 1829 when his ‘Rocket’ locomotive pottered along on the first commercial rail service, if you told him that Dubai would inaugurate a 100 kilometre per hour unmanned metro network 180 years later?
Firstly humans, (and predominantly pilots), caused or contributed in a big way to just about every fatal aviation accident we have suffered in recent years. There are very few fatal accidents these days but when they do happen technical reliability is such that system failure is seldom the cause - I admit that human/machine interfaces can be an issue but this is hardly the fault of the machine;
Secondly there is nothing much to stop us - we have the technology already, it just needs to be perfected and proven. The two biggest hurdles will be public opinion, egged on by its self-appointed mouthpiece the media; and the regulators, blown by the winds of political will. Otherwise we’re there…
It won't happen soon and it won’t happen overnight but it will probably begin with freighters reducing to a single pilot, backed up by a second in the rest area if required by duty time. The pilot’s health and alertness will be monitored by yet another system and the operational reliability of the aircraft will have been demonstrated to adequately allow for short ‘comfort breaks’. Eventually though you can expect to see an ‘aircraft manager’ in the cabin, with access to a few diagnostic tools but essentially responsible for looking after the walk-on cargo.
And if you doubt all this, imagine what George Stephenson would have said in 1829 when his ‘Rocket’ locomotive pottered along on the first commercial rail service, if you told him that Dubai would inaugurate a 100 kilometre per hour unmanned metro network 180 years later?
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