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      12-05-2020, 09:37 AM   #155
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JamesNoBrakes View Post
Not really, you don't have to be trained on an autopilot to go buy an aircraft with it and fly it into the ground (or have it installed in your plane). There's no training requirement for that. You appear to maybe be talking about commercial passenger service or something, but even then most of what you said doesn't hold true. I'm talking about private operations, like private car drivers. You should follow the equipment manual, which most people do, but for sure some leave the AP on a little longer and get a little closer than they should. A few just let it take them right into the runwayor the side of a mountain. The only time you have to be "trained" on the autopilot is when you take your check-ride in an aircraft already equipped with it. That's not a requirement to get your instrument rating. After you get your rating, you are free to get one installed or go buy another airplane with it and there's no training requirement.

Also, ATC will not warn you if are about to hit the ground from blowing through the DH on autopilot. Their primary responsibility is aircraft separation, in terms of keeping aircraft from running into each other. DH is typically 200' above the runway. In those kinds of conditions, tower won't see the aircraft since visibility is so low. Approach control is the one looking primary at radar, but no one is going to notice anything out of the ordinary as you continue descending 500+ fpm past DH. In some situations, approach control and the tower look at the aircraft's position on the ILS very closely (simultaneous ILS approaches), but they are looking at lateral separation and course deviation, not descent past DH and by all accounts, your descent past DH on autopilot would look perfectly normal. It's only that last 100 feet or so where you do "the thing" to make it so touching the runway doesn't kill you. 500fpm impact is enough to kill you.

And relying on ATC to warn you of the ground when you are not landing works about as well as you think it would. In other words, landmark accidents where commercial airliners plowed into mountains led to more automation systems installed in the aircraft, namely TAWS.

There's no co-pilot when you are flying your bonanza, TBM or King Air.

There is a totally new level "hitting the ground avoidance" that has been designed into some aircraft now, already credited with saving some lives. A friend helped develop this system for the F-16. It's an automated system that will prevent the aircraft from being run into terrain/the ground. It will recover the aircraft if the pilot fails to.
I work in the business of air traffic surveillance. I was talking about commercial aircraft pilots, not GA pilots. However, of the several GA pilots I work with, all are not semi-unconscious automobile drivers. I think you'll agree that GA pilots take training courses to get their FAA certification, which content is far above what the general driving public gets when they take high school drivers ed; State DMV hand out driver's licenses like candy at Halloween. So I'd bet that if a GA pilot has an auto pilot system in the plane he is flying, he well understands the operation of it and would not let it fly the plane into the ground, but I'm sure there are dumbass GA pilots too (I've never met one though). Most people in general do not read their car's owner's manual. Most drivers have no idea what auto pilot means and think airplanes fly themselves, so they think Tesla's Autopilot can drive the car by itself. I've been in Model 3 with the Autopilot in use and it scares the shit out of me, but then again I take the act of driving quite seriously since my life depends on it. I ride motorcycles on the street (for well over 40 years), so I have a completely different perspective on the act of driving than the general automotive driving public.

I'll repeat myself. In my opinion, the people who want a car that can drive itself (and just not in theory) don't have enough interest in their own personal safety and don't take the act of driving seriously. If more people did take the act of driving seriously, we wouldn't be having a discussion on this topic, because it'd not be a topic. Pilots use use auto pilot as a tool to fly the aircraft not as a substitute to fly it.

Finally, the automation of air travel is completely different situation than automation of ground-based transportation. The FAA is taking great strides to make the surveillance of GA aircraft better integrated into the NAS (not really on topic here). But the point I've made in this thread over and over is that automating the ground-based transportation system of the US is a completely different situation than the nation's air traffic system. There really is no comparison between the two. The FAA is an independent third-party that keeps aircraft separated; there is no third-party that keeps automated ground vehicle traffic separated. The FAA keeps aircraft from crossing paths at the same exact location at the same exact time and there 3-axis of motion for an airplane to avoid another aircraft on top of the several redundant systems for collision avoidance past ATC. Ground-based vehicular traffic has to to cross paths; there is actually a name for for such locations... intersections. If cars were kept at the relative distances that the FAA keeps aircraft separated, automated ground traffic would be spaced at distances that road capacity would be even less than it already is. No one would tolerate it. The engineering solution to keep cars from being at the same location at the same time, is extremely difficult and is very very expensive.
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