3 ms·
Why are we still building manned fighter planes?
by ryoshu 13y ago
Why are we still building manned fighter planes?
- pliny 13y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incident http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incide...
- munin 13y agowhat?! that's an argument for more unmanned planes. imagine if the RQ-170 had been a manned spy plane and Iran had captured a human pilot.
- VLM 13y agoLOL modern pilots are a little GPS focused and not as good at dead reckoning and pilotage as the olden days, and deserts are kind of featureless, but tricking a human into landing on the wrong side of the front lines is a pretty unlikely outcome.
- andrewflnr 13y agoA manned plane probably wouldn't have been tricked.
- tsotha 13y agoThe drone may not have been tricked either. It may have simply crashed.
- TsiCClawOfLight 13y agoA human pilot wouldn't have done this.
- VLM 13y agoRead about the early years of the F-4 and its gun pod. The wikipedia article is fairly good, although short. Those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it. The F-4 lesson was "everyone knew" that ever more expensive and technologically advanced munitions were the way to go, so no gun pod just drop missiles. (missiles are essentially somewhat dumb short range drones, although there's a lot of overlap in the categories...) Turned out to be a near disaster and they ended up bolting a human operated gun to the F-4. People actually died because of this design mistake. The USAF is in no hurry to kill a bunch more people with the same conceptual mistake. I am certain that the same scenario is about to play out with drones. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not with the USAF as the victims, but "in a decade or so" the same disaster will happen again. It is, after all, the same situation, so expecting a different outcome would be insanity.
- jessaustin 13y agoPeople actually died... Presumably most of these were F-4 pilots? I thought one of the most salient points of a drone is that it doesn't have a pilot?