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This isn't Skunkworks where they're developing experimental aircraft for extremely well trained pilots in the military. They're trying to make these for consum
by OnlineGladiator 7y ago
This isn't Skunkworks where they're developing experimental aircraft for extremely well trained pilots in the military. They're trying to make these for consumers who don't even want to get a pilot's license. They should be designed to be far safer than what is available today if that is their target audience.
- matz1 7y agoDoesn't matter if it military or end user. First you have to make it work then make it safe. A not safe but working consumer multirotor plane is still much better than safe but not working plane.
- OnlineGladiator 7y agoWe have decades of experience to learn from in the aviation industry, that is what we should be iterating on and benchmarking against. Making a new type of aircraft that is significantly more dangerous and requires significantly less training (so it is unrealistic to expect the consumer to understand the risk) is just valuing profits over human lives - full stop. Are you still okay with unsafe flying machines when they start falling out of the sky and killing people on the ground? As mentioned previously, these aren't even supposed to require a pilot's license, so you can't expect the customer to be trained like a pilot. The FAA rules are written in blood. If people want to experiment with new types of aircraft responsibly, that's fine! There is even a specific process for that, it's called an experimental certification. https://www.faa.gov/aircraft/air_cert/airworthiness_certification/sp_awcert/experiment/ https://www.faa.gov/aircraft/air_cert/airworthiness_certific... But selling these things to untrained consumers is just completely, utterly, reprehensibly irresponsible. That's probably why Kitty Hawk returned deposits - they realized the machines just weren't safe enough to sell to people.