Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

commercialappeal.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 182 posts

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#171

Post by sokoloff »

bronco21016 wrote: post #148
whiddershins wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let’s say you have one virtual pilot for 10 planes. They won’t all be landing at the same time. So that pilot could guide each one down successively during inclement weather. I bet that would be way more fun than the bunches of sitting around that I imagine is currently part of the job.

The sitting around can be boring but there’s little that’s more fun than turning off the autopilot and hand flying an Expressway Visual 31 at La Guardia in gusty winds with traffic departing runway 4. Do it at a workstation in a desk chair with none of the “stress” of the situation and I’m going to find another career. The combination of skills needed and the threat of life and limb just make stuff like that exciting…

I don’t think that the same population who currently flies would be the ones who would fly pilotless planes from desks.

I’ve flow personally for 22 years. Other than simulator-based training, I have no interest in flying a flight simulator. Why do that when the real thing is available and so much more compelling as you describe? No way I’d fly from a desk either, but that doesn’t mean that someone else wouldn’t be happy to have that job.

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#172

Post by lawlessone »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #98
ayyyolo wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a great take. The more we reduce the human survival instinct around these jobs, the better we'll all be. Humans do dumb shit when we're flooded with chemicals, both internal and external.

Computers do some pretty "dumb shit" when they're flooded with data and running bad algorithms. I mean 737MAX didn't need a pilot error in order to do something critically bad.

To be fair.. the computer in the 737max was being used to patch over the 737max being bad at flying.

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#173

Post by ChicagoBoy11 »

azinman2 wrote: post #125
bobbriody wrote: post #51

We're hiring! https://reliable.co/careers/ We built avionics, software, mechanisms and a comm system that enables automated operation of the plane from a remote command station. The remote operator has a GUI where they can command the aircraft. This article goes into a bit more detail about how it works: https://www.flightglobal.com/airframers/with-tesla-and-space...

What I haven't seen is any mention of what happens to all the pilots out there. Between COVID and now this, it seems like the path of a great middle/upper middle class job that's lasted for decades is doomed. For UPS/Fedex, I would also guess that the salary of the pilot is effectively a rounding error on all of the total costs of transporting objects around the world. What are your thoughts on this?

I can't speak for them, but as a private pilot who has become friends with lots of folks who are not career airline pilots, I can tell you that the delusion among that group of folks is quite high that things like this aren't coming for their jobs -- and fast.

The self-flying use case is, at least from a technical standpoint, far more straightforward than self driving, and the cost incentives are pretty huge. Not to mention the fact that some of this tech has already made its way into private aircraft, with Garmin already having a production system in place where non-pilot passengers can simply push a button on an aircraft and it will completely autonomously find a suitable airport to divert to, communicate with ATC, and land -- even taking adverse weather into account.

There is also a lot of regulatory and tech work at the FAA to also try to ulitize drone-like systems to help operate aircraft. The reality is that the vast majority of time that a pilot is in a flight it is quite low-intensity work (if there is any work to do at all). The thought here is that remote pilots could control the machine (or assist a single pilot in the cockpit) during critical phases of flight. The advatange here, of course, is that a remote pilot could do many such flights over a short period of time, whereas the one on board is stuck to the one flight even in moments where he/she has absolutely nothing to do.

Whichever way you slice it, if you think there is some argument for fully or partially autonomous driving, all of those arguments are orders of magnitude more compelling in flying. Timing, of course, is the real question mark.

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#174

Post by juliansimioni »

sokoloff wrote: post #170
ghayes wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flying by instruments, I wonder how high the risk truly is. One of the bigger concerns might be an instrument failure, like the failure of the airspeed sensors on Air France 447.

There were many failures in the cockpit of AF447. Almost all of them were aft of the instruments.

Problem exists between keyboard^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H yoke and chair

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#175

Post by bronco21016 »

sokoloff wrote: post #171
bronco21016 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sitting around can be boring but there’s little that’s more fun than turning off the autopilot and hand flying an Expressway Visual 31 at La Guardia in gusty winds with traffic departing runway 4. Do it at a workstation in a desk chair with none of the “stress” of the situation and I’m going to find another career. The combination of skills needed and the threat of life and limb just make stuff like that exciting…

I don’t think that the same population who currently flies would be the ones who would fly pilotless planes from desks. I’ve flow personally for 22 years. Other than simulator-based training, I have no interest in flying a flight simulator. Why do that when the real thing is available and so much more compelling as you describe? No way I’d fly from a desk either, but that doesn’t mean that someone else wouldn’t be ha…

Agreed, it’s not in the interest of my career. I was more just commenting about the GP’s thought that it might be more fun to get to only intervene for landing. Ten simulator landings will never outweigh one real landing, even if the price is butts in seats for 10 hours.

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#176

Post by kcolford »

meheleventyone wrote: post #157
asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moreover, high end dual frequency GPS receivers like you'd surely put in a plane will typically have sub-meter precision.

Depending on the environment? GPS is still susceptible to signal reflection and LoS blocking.

I don't believe LoS blocking is really an issue as you approach an airport runway from above...

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#177

Post by andoriyu »

lawlessone wrote: post #172
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Computers do some pretty "dumb shit" when they're flooded with data and running bad algorithms. I mean 737MAX didn't need a pilot error in order to do something critically bad.

To be fair.. the computer in the 737max was being used to patch over the 737max being bad at flying.

Not bad at flying, but flying not like other 737. Which would have required retraining, which is a hard sell.

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#178

Post by hansthehorse »

outworlder wrote: post #115
akira2501 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they're going to be thinking about trying to survive and get to a place where they can land or at least ditch the plane survivably. I think you immediately have to question how often this has been the source of a disaster. To me, this seems highly unlikely to have been a problem, or to be a problem at all. Most accidents happen near airports. Most airports are in populated areas, because an airport far removed from…

> Most accidents happen near airports. Most airports are in populated areas Are they? I'd argue that they generally aren't... except that, over time, cities may grow until they are right next to the airport again. And then new airports get constructed - usually far away. > terms of freight Only for certain classes of freight. You distribution center needs ready access to transportation, it doesn't have to be next to…

Most accidents happen within the first three and last eight minutes of the flight.

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#179

Post by tintor »

marcosdumay wrote: post #76
tintor wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you believe that water transportation would be harder to automate than air transportation?

There is more "noise" to deal with on the water than on the air. For a start, there is the entire ocean floor, that is relevant on many places where ships usually go into, and isn't as simple to map as a runway.

That problem can be avoided in the beginning. Ships could pilot themselves in deep waters between ports and leave docking / undocking to local human port pilots.

Re: FedEx feeder plane takes flight without pilot in test for Reliable Robotics

#180

Post by meheleventyone »

kcolford wrote: post #176
meheleventyone wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depending on the environment? GPS is still susceptible to signal reflection and LoS blocking.

I don't believe LoS blocking is really an issue as you approach an airport runway from above...

If you can make sure you only have emergencies when near an airport then you've already solved a lot of the hard problems.
Post reply on HN