How Long

[Liquid Charlie]

Looking at all the automation, drone strikes and such I often wonder how long before the heavy metal just stops needing pilots. I will be general aviation, home builders and air show performers left. Flight schools won't be able to sustain themselves if the puppy mills stop. The group of young guns starting today could be the "farewell" group if they go right to retirement age. Aviation and how we know it will change dramatically in 50 years. We went from no maps and drawing maps as we flew along to GPS in about that time frame. Time marches on and change is all part of that.

[Nark1]

Good question.

I generally look to the military as the innovator of technology,  fly by wire, advent of GPS, use of drones etc... (not always the case, I think use of composite material is a civilian led, different fuels etc..)

I don't want to get in to details, but drones aren't as reliable as one would think.  They crash, a lot. I've done missions recovering them from the desert because the weren't destroyed enough, and the brass didn't want to waste a hellfire on it.

I think the Max set back the FAA many years in certification.  Scrutiny by Congress and the public won't allow something like a single pilot transport jet for a very long time. From there, automated systems are even further away.

I have seen all too often, garbage entered in to the FMS, al beit, corrected eventually, but sometimes taking a second look at it is needed to avoid larger errors.

[Colonel]

I think we will see single pilot in our lifetimes.  It's going to be a while before autonomous
computing can be trusted to do away with the single pilot entirely.

PS  Not sure I agree that innovation comes from the military ... Microsoft and Intel, for
example, have developed some world-altering software and hardware, pretty much entirely
without any military involvement AFAIK.  Same for telecoms eg cisco, juniper, etc.

The more paper there is, the more something lags the leading edge.  Standards are nice,
but certification is like a three pack a day cigarette habit for a marathon runner, and as the
MAX showed us, can be completely circumvented and perverted, as to be absolutely useless.

Look at the civilian homebuilt market.  That's where all the innovation occurs, free of paperwork
and certification overhead.

[Eric Janson]

The whole point of having 2 Pilots is to improve safety by having task sharing, areas of responsibility and the PF/PM concept.

Just did a Sim session last night with a dual hydraulic failure - you are busy as the PM! The other guy is 100% flying the aircraft as the autopilot is not available.

On guy flies - the other monitors and calls out any deviations. If one Pilot makes a mistake the other is supposed to catch it.

One Pilot makes no sense to me on a complex aircraft.

Automated passenger aircraft is a fantasy imho - never going to happen. You wouldn't believe the number of computer faults/strange events I've seen over the years on my highly computerised jet.

[Liquid Charlie]

I'm thinking more alone the line of "stick and rudder" pilots. I'm thinking actual pilot skills will not be required. The warm bodies of body will be there as back up to make the pax feel better and monitor computers. A computer will be able to do anything a pilot can do and likely to a higher average standard. We seem to forget how technology marches on and what we think of as high tech today is tomorrow's ancient history. Take something simple such as conventional gear which was a standard and today it's become a mystical thing of stories. Garmin playing with auto land, Fifty years from now we will be fully automated, skipping along in low orbit and short haul commuters being replaced by hyperloop trains.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

[quote]Take something simple such as conventional gear which was a standard and today it's become a mystical thing of stories. [/quote]

It is only a mystical thing of stories for the flight training schools and their instructors.

There are thousands of conventional gear airplanes in the world and more being built every day by home builders.

Getting checked out is easy as there are tens of thousands of pilots who fly conventional gear airplanes.

The thing that amazes me is the fact that so many so called class one flight instructors are unable to fly a simple J 3 Cub......it is amazing that a class one flight instructor can be so lacking in flying skills...just simply amazing.

[Liquid Charlie]

Indeed Chuck it was all we flew back in the day, almost all the aircraft I flew were conventional gear and we never thought twice about jumping in an aeroplane with a training wheel with no checkout. It was dumb ass simple.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

It would be interesting to know how many flight schools have an instructor on staff that is qualified to do tail wheel check outs.

[Colonel]

Fundamental pilot skills have been viewed as unimportant for so long,
they have been almost completely been bred out of the pilot population.



... and that's what you end up with.  As long as everyone is happy with
completely unnecessary crashes, which apparently they are.

The idea of any instructor having enough skill to fly tailwheel is ludicrious -
and that's exactly how Transport wants it.

[Liquid Charlie]

That's what i find amusing and ironic that in this day and age you need to have a checkout by a qualified instructor to fly a tail dragger. It's almost as bad as Wong Bros wanting you to fly a checkout to learn how to use a transponder - damn --