Boeing looking into passenger planes without pilots

[Kevin Lancaster]

Boeing looking into passenger planes without pilots

Boeing has started researching commercial-passenger jets which will fly without pilots, according to a report by the Seattle Times.

 

[Geoff.D]

I better use up all my flyer miles before this happens!

 

[Drifter]

Nope!!

 

[pinball wizard]

That explains the push to ban laptops from the passenger cabin. You'll need that and not a box cutter to hijack one of these.

 

[The_Ogre]

OK, almost like a taxi.

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

been wondering about this for a while,

in truth most planes fly without a pilot , mostly autopilot,
pilots are there for tradition as well as safety mainly.

if planes could operate as drones, controlled by some central office somewhere,
it could work quite well, good luck convincing passengers though, but cargo planes? why not?
I mean if one of those crashes, nobody dies....

I think it might be a good idea for UPS/Fedex ect to try it out, see how it goes....
I mean if they can perfect it to work reliably that is...

 

[Crowley]

No thanks. When the OS freezes, how do you turn it off and turn it back on?

 

[Vrotappel]

BSOD

 

[Thor]

Let them trail it with someone else's life first then I will use this maybe 10 years from now or so. Qatar here I come.

 

[Thor]

BSOD

Literally

 

[The_Ogre]

been wondering about this for a while,

in truth most planes fly without a pilot , mostly autopilot,
pilots are there for tradition as well as safety mainly.

if planes could operate as drones, controlled by some central office somewhere,
it could work quite well, good luck convincing passengers though, but cargo planes? why not?
I mean if one of those crashes, nobody dies....

I think it might be a good idea for UPS/Fedex ect to try it out, see how it goes....
I mean if they can perfect it to work reliably that is...

Yeah, but I have yet to see a plane take off a land solely using autopilot. I don't mind it flying on autopilot at 20 000ft in the air, there's still time for the pilots to recover it and fly by hand if something goes wrong.

What would you do at 1000ft? I'm sorry, but I do not trust a plane enough to know whether that's a mountain up ahead or the sonar is giving false signals.

KABOOM KFC MARRAFAKKA!

 

[satanboy]

BSOD

Could a pilot in the modern planes fly without computers?

 

[Ninja'd]

 

[Idiosyncratic]

Considering Airbus aircraft experience technical glitches on more than 40% of flights, nope, please, just no.

Hell, even single pilot ops would be unwise. Imagine if AI was in control of Qantas Flight 32 - more than 100 errors were detected and yet the 8 computers couldn't determine what the actual issue was.

 

[gregmcc]

This will never take off. Imagine the plane crashing, they will get sued for every penny.

 

[satanboy]

This will never take off. Imagine the plane crashing, they will get sued for every penny.

So there are no planes crashing at the moment?

 

[Rocket Raccoon]

The graphics for the new Flight Simulator will be more realistic than ever.

 

[Idiosyncratic]

Yeah, but I have yet to see a plane take off a land solely using autopilot. I don't mind it flying on autopilot at 20 000ft in the air, there's still time for the pilots to recover it and fly by hand if something goes wrong.

What would you do at 1000ft? I'm sorry, but I do not trust a plane enough to know whether that's a mountain up ahead or the sonar is giving false signals.

KABOOM KFC MARRAFAKKA!

Autopilot with Autoland. It happens, humans can't legally do a CAT IIIC approach with no DH without an autopilot that's sophisticated enough to flare the aircraft. However, humans have to monitor the aircraft and usually Autoland is avoided like the plague as aircraft like passing the buck back to the pilots if it can't figure out what to do. If there aren't any pilots to pass the buck to, what then?

The entire aviation world have to change. ATC would have to have direct input into the control unit, and considering you'll still have aircraft with real pilots for the next 40 years at least, this could become chaotic.

Edit: Oh, and it's radio altimeter by the way, submarines use sonar

 

[The_Librarian]

Nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope

There have been a few incidents of total loss of control - how will the autopilot handle it? As well as it will be quite easy to take over the control center on the ground with a small armed force, and bam! control over x number of planes...

Cargo planes I have no problem with - but with a plane fully loaded with human passengers - it is a big nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope

 

[Moosedrool]

Still too much that can go wrong imo. It might seem like a good idea and isn't the first time people try ILS and autopilot without anyone in the cabin.

Now for the drone approach. Would you trust a bank's security without insurance? High jacking wouldn't even require a hacker to be onboard.