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If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

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Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#61

Post by PNewling »

deadbabe wrote: post #60
jcul wrote: post #33

> The only victim of the accident was Wim Delaere, a computer science student reported to have been either 18 or 19 years old.[4][5][1] He was sleeping alone after celebrating the end of his university exams the previous day when the MiG crashed and killed him at 10:30 am. His mother and brother were shopping for groceries in Kortrijk, and his father was working in Ypres.[4] From the linked Wikipedia article on one o…

His death later inspired the movie Donnie Darko, about a kid in 1988 who is killed by a jet engine in similar circumstances.

I can't find anything that would suggest this is true, but I would love if you were able to link me something proving me wrong, as I loved that movie growing up and like reading about it still.

Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#62

Post by throwup238 »

appreciatorBus wrote: post #56
mikkupikku wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is they're automatically retired from flight after the second (or maybe third?) ejection, not automatically after the first.

It feels like a good chunk of the comments here imply that ejection is a pretty common activity, hence the interest in what happens next, both to the pilot and the jet. I don’t have any ready statistics, but if ejection was a commonplace activity then the world‘s air forces would be depleted of planes in very short order. It wouldn’t shock me if there’s a policy about pilots who ejected more than x times, but I would…

The Martin Baker homepage shows 7802 lives saved using just their brand of ejection seat so it's not exceedingly rare.

I'd estimate less than 5% of fighter jet pilots eject during their career.

Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#63

Post by trenchpilgrim »

LorenPechtel wrote: post #53
pdonis wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the autopilot is engaged, the pilot won't be ejecting, because the aircraft will be in some kind of controlled flight. Autopilots will be disengaging and lighting up a big red light in the cockpit well before the aircraft gets to the point where the pilot would consider ejecting. Remember that ejecting is an absolute last resort, since the pilot is quite likely to be injured and runs a significant risk of being ki…

Disagree--it can be entirely sane to eject from a fully functional aircraft. 1) Something is going catastrophically wrong with the plane. It's flying now, but soon that fire will burn through the hydraulics, safer to punch while it's still in controlled flight. 2) There is not enough fuel to put it on a runway. Once again, punch while it's still stable. We've even seen a civilian do that--ferry flight with one of tho…

In re: 4 - during desert storm Lt Patrick Olson managed to bring a damaged A-10 back to base. He attempted to land, but his damaged hydraulics were insufficient and the plane cartwheeled, landing upside down resulting in pilot death. It is likely Lt Olson would have survived by ejecting near the base in a designated area, and this became SOP for that category of failure afterwards.

I also recall reading about another damaged A-10 in the same conflict that managed to touch down only to discover the brakes didn't work. Pilot overran the runway but survived. Can't recall pilot's name off the top of my head.

Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#64

Post by HeyLaughingBoy »

deadbabe wrote: post #60
jcul wrote: post #33

> The only victim of the accident was Wim Delaere, a computer science student reported to have been either 18 or 19 years old.[4][5][1] He was sleeping alone after celebrating the end of his university exams the previous day when the MiG crashed and killed him at 10:30 am. His mother and brother were shopping for groceries in Kortrijk, and his father was working in Ypres.[4] From the linked Wikipedia article on one o…

His death later inspired the movie Donnie Darko, about a kid in 1988 who is killed by a jet engine in similar circumstances.

/pedantic

That's not at all what Donnie Darko is about, but a jet engine from an unaccounted-for airplane does land in his house.

Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#65

Post by HeyLaughingBoy »

PNewling wrote: post #61
deadbabe wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His death later inspired the movie Donnie Darko, about a kid in 1988 who is killed by a jet engine in similar circumstances.

I can't find anything that would suggest this is true, but I would love if you were able to link me something proving me wrong, as I loved that movie growing up and like reading about it still.

You have no idea how old you saying "I loved that movie growing up" makes me feel :-)

Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#66

Post by toast0 »

Merad wrote: post #36
quotemstr wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? If I'm the human pilot, I can pull the ejection lever for multiple reasons, including my just being an idiot. The plane, after I eject, should do something reasonable. Maybe it * starts broadcasting a mayday? * crashes into the nearest large body of water? * attempts to fly itself back to base (we have the technology)? I mean, it has to do something and flying straight and level until it runs out of fuel is unli…

I dunno, the current approach seems quite reasonable. In the grand scheme of things the overwhelming majority of the Earth's surface is empty space where a plane crash is unlikely to cause much damage. You also have the complication that military pilots usually try to make sure their plane will crash in a "safe" area before they eject - many have died because they waited too long to eject trying to avoid a populated…

> You also have the complication that military pilots usually try to make sure their plane will crash in a "safe" area before they eject - many have died because they waited too long to eject trying to avoid a populated area. Giving the plan a mind of its own after they pull the handle would be unlikely to go over very well.

If the plane could be trusted to do the right thing, maybe some of those pilots would have ejected where it was best for pilot survival and let the plane do what was best for bystander survival.

That's a good reason to consider what behavior is desirable and achievable when the pilot departs before landing. Possibly also useful if the pilot loses conciousness as well.

Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#67

Post by yetihehe »

jon-wood wrote: post #34
quotemstr wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but the autopilot should have some kind of contingency programming in case the pilot is mistaken about the aircraft being unflyable.

Even in that case this is a military aircraft, one of the most highly prized secrets many nations hold. Probably the most reasonable response to an ejection the aircraft could take is to nose dive into the ground and slam the throttle to afterburners, which isn’t far of what will happen naturally as soon as the pilot isn’t asking the plane to stay straight and level.

Maybe the best case would be to disintegrate into small mostly harmless pieces, that won't travel too fast.

Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#68

Post by edgineer »

SoftTalker wrote: post #19
quotemstr wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? If I'm the human pilot, I can pull the ejection lever for multiple reasons, including my just being an idiot. The plane, after I eject, should do something reasonable. Maybe it * starts broadcasting a mayday? * crashes into the nearest large body of water? * attempts to fly itself back to base (we have the technology)? I mean, it has to do something and flying straight and level until it runs out of fuel is unli…

Ejecting for for no reason would end the pilot's flying career. Ejecting for any reason will result in an investigation, at minimum. Pilots are expected to fly the airplane until the last extremity. So while yes it's possible, it's unlikely, and the return on investment of making the plane able to do something like "return to base" in that circumstance would be a large negative number.

One F-35 costs around $100 million. I count two that perhaps theoretically, with a clever autopilot, could have landed on their own after pilot ejection. At the scale of $200 million I'm not certain that the additional engineering of the already-clever jet would really have cost more than that.

https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2024/10/pilot-error-blame...

https://simpleflying.com/f35-pilot-troubleshooting-lockheed-...

Re: If a pilot ejects, what is the autopilot programmed to do? (2018)

#69

Post by latentsea »

ffb7c5 wrote: post #32

I think we should make an API call to an LLM with the current GPS location to decide what to do, bonus points if we can mount a forward facing camera and upload the picture as well

> bonus points if we can mount a forward facing camera and upload the picture as well

As an NFT of course.

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