3 ms·

There's no chance that automation will advance such that you only need one pilot. The pilots job is to babysit the machine, hardware and software. And you need

by mantap 7y ago

There's no chance that automation will advance such that you only need one pilot. The pilots job is to babysit the machine, hardware and software. And you need two for the obvious reason that sometimes one is incapacitated. More complex software increases the need for two pilots.

cjrp 7y ago
> And you need two for the obvious reason that sometimes one is incapacitated See the new Garmin/Cirrus/Piper "autoland" feature. Obviously GA is very different from Commercial, but there are definitely people in the industry working on this.
cameldrv 7y ago
Airbus is openly working on it. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/28/airbus-pushing-ahead-in-tech-as-it-aims-for-single-pilot-planes-cto.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/28/airbus-pushing-ahead-in-tech... If you go back to the 1940s, some big aircraft had five flight crew for long-range flights. They progressively dropped the navigator, then the flight engineer in the 80s, because computers could do their jobs. Many small business jets already can fly legally with a single pilot. When automation reaches the point that the computer can fly the entire flight, and the pilot merely needs to monitor, as we are close to with this new Garmin autoland system, the pilot incapacitation argument for having two crew members goes away. It's inevitable and just a matter of time.
- throw0101a 7y ago
  There are some strange corner cases out there: > Already requested and had the data linked chart for our landing weight sent up to the aircraft: we require 5,671 feet on a wet runway, good braking, zero tailwind. Each knot of tailwind adds 150 to the distance required, so even one knot of tailwind exceeds the runway length. * https://jethead.wordpress.com/2014/12/13/flying-a-jet-in-the-los-angeles-storms-december-12-2014/ https://jethead.wordpress.com/2014/12/13/flying-a-jet-in-the...
  - cameldrv 7y ago
    Interesting story, but the FMS already can calculate the required distances in various scenarios. I'm not aware of an FMS that can do the what-if type analysis automatically about the range of acceptable wind directions and speeds, but that can certainly be built. Instead of the F/O flying the approach, he could simply have let the autopilot do the whole thing and focus himself, as he did, on the strategic aspects of the flight.

by mantap 7y ago

cjrp 7y ago

> And you need two for the obvious reason that sometimes one is incapacitated See the new Garmin/Cirrus/Piper "autoland" feature. Obviously GA is very different from Commercial, but there are definitely people in the industry working on this.

cameldrv 7y ago

Airbus is openly working on it. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/28/airbus-pushing-ahead-in-tech-as-it-aims-for-single-pilot-planes-cto.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/28/airbus-pushing-ahead-in-tech... If you go back to the 1940s, some big aircraft had five flight crew for long-range flights. They progressively dropped the navigator, then the flight engineer in the 80s, because computers could do their jobs. Many small business jets already can fly legally with a single pilot. When automation reaches the point that the computer can fly the entire flight, and the pilot merely needs to monitor, as we are close to with this new Garmin autoland system, the pilot incapacitation argument for having two crew members goes away. It's inevitable and just a matter of time.

throw0101a 7y ago
There are some strange corner cases out there: > Already requested and had the data linked chart for our landing weight sent up to the aircraft: we require 5,671 feet on a wet runway, good braking, zero tailwind. Each knot of tailwind adds 150 to the distance required, so even one knot of tailwind exceeds the runway length. * https://jethead.wordpress.com/2014/12/13/flying-a-jet-in-the-los-angeles-storms-december-12-2014/ https://jethead.wordpress.com/2014/12/13/flying-a-jet-in-the...
- cameldrv 7y ago
  Interesting story, but the FMS already can calculate the required distances in various scenarios. I'm not aware of an FMS that can do the what-if type analysis automatically about the range of acceptable wind directions and speeds, but that can certainly be built. Instead of the F/O flying the approach, he could simply have let the autopilot do the whole thing and focus himself, as he did, on the strategic aspects of the flight.