There is no such thing "truly fail safe software" because you can ALWAYS make a scenario where some piece of hardware fails and there is nothing anybody can do to prevent the plane from falling out of the sky (example: Lockerbie). There is no such thing as "AI" -- True intelligence involves making the intuitive leap. Computer AI is merely backward/forward chaining of statistical information to come to the 'course of action most likely to get to the preapproved configuration/outcome'. The computer code will not 'create' anything on its own. If the programmer didn't think of it, the software won't create it. I am not saying your comment(s) are not without merit. It may be the software should have auto-disengaged and flashed a message saying "I give up - Humans need to fly the plane." Regarding your WW2 commment -- As an old SAC pilot told me before my first lesson: "A Driver walks up to the plane, gets in, and moves the plane from one airport to another. A PILOT walks up to the plan

(Written on 2019年 04月 05日)(Permalink)

My flight instructor beat into my brain to always make sure safety wire was always present where it needed to be. And if I wasn't sure, ASK. I ended up making sketches of where it was supposed to be. I was told horror tales of nose gears falling out on take-off rotation.

(Written on 2019年 03月 22日)(Permalink)

Not to mention the restroom operator/cleaner for not having the correct first aid kit available by the sink.

(Written on 2017年 04月 13日)(Permalink)

What about Air France 447? Or are only talking about metal hitting metal (CTIA)?

(Written on 2016年 12月 01日)(Permalink)

When do y'all think the airlines will go the way of the cruise ships whereby congress allows the airlines to flag the planes in Panama and crew them with foreign personnel that get paid a fraction of what US crews are paid? There is a word for this type of business arrangement but it escapes me at the moment.

(Written on 2016年 09月 06日)(Permalink)

I agreed but with a ?: during descent why didn't outside (ambient) pressure differential create a 'reverse' leak path? Clearly there is negative pressure differential on the tire as evidenced by the deformation. As for the shape - that's minimizing volume with a constant surface area while also minimizing surface tension: tires have a higher surface tension than water bottles (Young's modulus actually).

(Written on 2016年 05月 10日)(Permalink)

I take comments as an opportunity to learn. I ask myself 'what would I have done in that situation?' I live in a big city and do all my flying at an airport with 10,000 feet of concrete runway and that seems just as wide. So an engine failure in a C152 at takeoff is plain vanilla compared to what his bloke had to contend with. I didn't know about the 'land parallel to the furrows' (see below). This is not to say that all comments are created equal, "some are more equal than others."

(Written on 2016年 02月 05日)(Permalink)

So in a forced landing situation fly parallel to the waves and furrows - good to know.

(Written on 2016年 02月 03日)(Permalink)

He took off from the grass strip. You can hear the engine sound change a few seconds before it stopped. When he sees that he's going into the trees on the first bounce he shouts "shit shit shit" (merde in French). He then goes over the trees and you can hear the trees hit the plane. Then he turns to the left and I believe his left wing tip dug into the dirt and this is what flipped the plane. The caption at the end says the pilot is well and didn't get a scratch.

(Written on 2016年 02月 03日)(Permalink)

Everyone who built them is either dead or dying. And paper gets thrown out when a program ends (Mgmt always says "it costs too much and besides there are folks here who will remember how to recreate the wheel when the next contract comes arguing in 10 years."). And then there's the mgmt types who think "it's just an engineering problem - any kid with Matlab can solve the problem." Been there, heard that - got the ulcer to prove it.

(Written on 2016年 01月 11日)(Permalink)