Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability • Hacker News Board

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#91

Post by kawfey » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:24 PM UTC

savrajsingh wrote: post #89

eternalny1 wrote: post #24

This is a seriously impressive bit of software engineering. It seems as simple as "push a button" to the layman but what happens when: There is a thunderstorm between the airport and the runway The nearest runway is closed due to a blizzard There is a mountain between the normal 3-degree glide-slope and the runway, an "offset approach" There is a 40-knot crosswind You have an engine out That's just a few, I'm a comme…

I’d hope that autoland connects to Garmin HQ and then they can coordinate and also just call up the tower and tell them what’s going on. Managing airspace and radio communications is the tricky part imo

Uncontrolled airspace is much more of a concern, since there is no tower HQ can call.

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#92

Post by mhb » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:24 PM UTC

nabla9 wrote: post #31

eternalny1 wrote: post #24

This is a seriously impressive bit of software engineering. It seems as simple as "push a button" to the layman but what happens when: There is a thunderstorm between the airport and the runway The nearest runway is closed due to a blizzard There is a mountain between the normal 3-degree glide-slope and the runway, an "offset approach" There is a 40-knot crosswind You have an engine out That's just a few, I'm a comme…

It's to be used only in the event that the pilot is incapacitated. Because it's an emergency feature engaged by a passenger or automatically, it probably can't manage all complex situations. It may be just good weather emergency landing. Check fuel and wind, steer to nearest emergency airport and land. Best effort is better than no effort and dying. > There is a mountain between the normal 3-degree glide-slope and th…

From https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21409114

During those first few seconds after I hit the Autoland button, the system went through a series of complex calculations and decision-making processes to determine the nearest suitable runway based on runway length, width, and surface; fuel remaining; crosswind component; terrain; obstacles; and general weather information. The system requires an RNAV approach, but beyond that, the runway and weather criteria can be decided by the airframe manufacturer.

The system even forecasts its own weather if the nearest suitable runway is a significant distance away, long enough that the current ADS-B or SiriusXM weather may not be valid. It uses the latest weather trend information, for example, to determine if a thunderstorm might move into the runway environment where it intends to land. It will route the airplane around thunderstorms as well as terrain and obstacles, all of which it gets from its internal databases. If en route to a runway it determines, because of changing weather conditions, that another runway is closer or more suitable, it will change its destination. It can even estimate changing barometric conditions and adjust the altimeter—using algorithms. Garmin engineers say the calculated barometric readings are within 0.01 inches of mercury of actual ambient conditions.

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#93

Post by vidarh » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:27 PM UTC

asdfman123 wrote: post #53

eternalny1 wrote: post #24

This is a seriously impressive bit of software engineering. It seems as simple as "push a button" to the layman but what happens when: There is a thunderstorm between the airport and the runway The nearest runway is closed due to a blizzard There is a mountain between the normal 3-degree glide-slope and the runway, an "offset approach" There is a 40-knot crosswind You have an engine out That's just a few, I'm a comme…

Question: how close are we to totally self-flying planes? I feel like we could easily get there before we got self-driving cars, if we wanted to. Would the costs for short hops be comparable to a commercial airplane ticket? Because it would be awesome to charter small flights from an app to jump to a nearby city.

This is what companies like Lilium are aiming for [1], and they're aiming for passenger operations starting in 2025 on a "taxi" type basis, probably initially with a pilot on board, though from what I understand this is largely because they don't expect to get approval for autonomous operation from day one. Of course there's no guarantee they'll meet that target, but they're also just one of many companies working on this.

[1] https://lilium.com/newsroom-detail/taking-to-the-skies-fligh...

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#94

Post by kgilpin » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:30 PM UTC

asdfman123 wrote: post #53

eternalny1 wrote: post #24

This is a seriously impressive bit of software engineering. It seems as simple as "push a button" to the layman but what happens when: There is a thunderstorm between the airport and the runway The nearest runway is closed due to a blizzard There is a mountain between the normal 3-degree glide-slope and the runway, an "offset approach" There is a 40-knot crosswind You have an engine out That's just a few, I'm a comme…

Question: how close are we to totally self-flying planes? I feel like we could easily get there before we got self-driving cars, if we wanted to. Would the costs for short hops be comparable to a commercial airplane ticket? Because it would be awesome to charter small flights from an app to jump to a nearby city.

One thing to keep in mind is that any type of auto-fly is dependent on a LOT of automation systems on the plane itself being functional. For example, instruments, sensors, autopilot, auto throttle.

To be considered safe, an auto-fly needs to be able to gracefully degrade as the subsystems in which it depends start to fail. Human pilots are trained to handle this by compensating for system failures in a variety of ways, including compensation (eg in a split flap scenario) and disabling (turning off a misbehaving autopilot). Ultimately, a human pilot can always turn off all the automation and fly the plane by looking out the window (or, in poor conditions, using gyro powered “steam” gauges).

In the case that the pilot is disabled, then auto-land is a great option, even though it’s reliant on so many subsystems. But for an always-on auto-fly, the requirement to gracefully degrade, and degrade, and degrade, and still operate at the level of a human pilot using the “Mark 1 eyeball” is a tough one which hasn’t yet been met (as far as I know).

There’s mention in this discussion of fully automated drones. But, those are basically expendable if there’s a serious system failure, since there are no souls on board.

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#95

Post by code4tee » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:30 PM UTC

This is impressive. Use case is for an incapacitated pilot. It won’t work well or at all if the aircraft itself is having issues or in other emergency scenarios. As such it doesn’t replace the need for qualified pilots at the controls.

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#96

Post by carleverett » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:31 PM UTC

jonplackett wrote: post #85

Question: A private jet is obviously bad for the environment, but how does a propeller plane compare carbon-wise to driving a car the same distance?

Not good. A Cessna 172 cruises at 140 mph and burns 8.5 gph of 100LL fuel, the equivalent of 16.5 mpg, and this is at cruise speed, not accounting for taxi, run-up, and flying the pattern during a normal flight.

Not to mention we're still burning lead in most propeller aircraft as well.

Fortunately this isn't a very popular way of getting around.

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#97

Post by tialaramex » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:33 PM UTC

eternalny1 wrote: post #71

usrusr wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still makes me wonder: do you really need/want all that automation or would it make more sense to prepare for putting a remote pilot into the loop? Not for virtually holding the stick, but for looking at telemetry, communicating and doing all the high level decisions.

This is what some of the new "fully automated" semi-truck companies are doing. Remote truckers in an office, similar to a UAV drone pilot.

When a truck (or a train) can't see what to do on its own, it can brake to a full stop and remain motionless until a human intervenes. Cell network crashed? Mountain in the way of the transmitter? Somebody stepped on the cable? Whatever it is, most problems will be averted by just always braking to a halt and waiting.

This is not an option in a plane. If it was, this technology wouldn't be needed - if the pilot is incapacitated just brake to a halt and step out of the plane...

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#98

Post by usrusr » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:36 PM UTC

asdfman123 wrote: post #88

usrusr wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that a situation where a machine would excel? One challenge is the abundance of decisions with only one non-deadly option, the other challenge is lack of time. The first challenge is solved by well-defined decision trees and mental checklists, but those make the second challenge harder. Computers don't need to balance between checklist thoroughness and decision latency, they can look at all the data they have i…

There's probably a wide range of unusual, one-off edge cases that almost never happen which would be impossible or difficult to find. And maybe catching/handling them properly would involve more sensors, when people really just want a well-trained human who is able to improvise in the cockpit. It would be difficult code a machine to find a good landing spot in extremely variable terrain. For instance, I saw a video o…

I'm not a pilot, but the by far most dangerous time to have an engine problem is the period that starts the moment you have accelerated too much to safely stop the plane on the ground and that ends with having sufficient speed and altitude to glide back to an emergency landing. There surely are defined procedures for reaching the least deadly outcome for every phase within that period (basically a lookup table based on accumulated energy, with different input options, with either time or airspeed and altitude is proxies for accumulated energy). Being well trained just means applying those rules with minimum hesitation.

Even experience cannot be much of a factor on top of that, as very few pilots will ever experience a scenario like that outside the simulator. My layman's suspicion, honed in the MCAS debates, tells me that the only other thing experience and human "general intelligence and gut feeling" can add to the equation is educated guesswork regarding which data to distrust when things just don't add up consistently due to a malfunction.

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#99

Post by neom » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:36 PM UTC

savrajsingh wrote: post #89

eternalny1 wrote: post #24

This is a seriously impressive bit of software engineering. It seems as simple as "push a button" to the layman but what happens when: There is a thunderstorm between the airport and the runway The nearest runway is closed due to a blizzard There is a mountain between the normal 3-degree glide-slope and the runway, an "offset approach" There is a 40-knot crosswind You have an engine out That's just a few, I'm a comme…

I’d hope that autoland connects to Garmin HQ and then they can coordinate and also just call up the tower and tell them what’s going on. Managing airspace and radio communications is the tricky part imo

I'd presume the plane will also start to squawk 7700, shouldn't be an issue then.

Re: Piper Announces First GA Aircraft with Autoland Capability

#100

Post by Xelbair » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:38 PM UTC

nabla9 wrote: post #31

eternalny1 wrote: post #24

This is a seriously impressive bit of software engineering. It seems as simple as "push a button" to the layman but what happens when: There is a thunderstorm between the airport and the runway The nearest runway is closed due to a blizzard There is a mountain between the normal 3-degree glide-slope and the runway, an "offset approach" There is a 40-knot crosswind You have an engine out That's just a few, I'm a comme…

It's to be used only in the event that the pilot is incapacitated. Because it's an emergency feature engaged by a passenger or automatically, it probably can't manage all complex situations. It may be just good weather emergency landing. Check fuel and wind, steer to nearest emergency airport and land. Best effort is better than no effort and dying. > There is a mountain between the normal 3-degree glide-slope and th…

>> Cruise missiles have had similar technology for a long time.

so that's where Boeing got the idea for 737MAX!