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Comment by WalterBright | Hacker News Reader

> When you look at airplane crashes, it’s not equipment failure. It’s human error.

A lot of the crashes are due to equipment failure. Take a look at the series "Aviation Disasters". A pilot is needed to figure out what is wrong, and to compensate to bring the airplane back. A computer program can't do that.

Such is far, far more complex and nuanced than dealing with a failure on a car. Just take Sully's landing on the Hudson after a flock of geese took out his engines. What computer program could have figured out why the engines failed, and what was possible for the airplane to do? Evaluate the weather conditions, and make the best choice of landing spot? Phooey.

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http://www.bbc.com/future/bespoke/20140724-flight-risk/

This may provide some useful insight.

207 crashes - human error; 82 crashes - weather conditions; 74 crashes - mechanical failures; 23 crashes - crime

That doesn't include all the incidents where the pilot figured out what was wrong and what corrective action to take, and landed the airplane safely.

And besides, what do you do at 30,000 feet with a planeload of people and an emergency and nobody in charge?

Even if computers never save the passengers in these emergencies, as long as they do save them from more pilot error emergencies then it's worth it. Sure the Hudson river passengers may have died, but at the same time the 9/11, Air France, Malaysia Airlines, etc ones may have lived. Hell, you could even have no improvement in safety anywhere and it might still be a good idea. Flying is already so safe that there's no harm in doubling the fatality rate. New technology doesn't always have to improve everything to be worthwhile.

This is more a political problem - customer fears, unions, regulations, etc.

> Flying is already so safe that there's no harm in doubling the fatality rate.

The marketing campaign writes itself!

Do the pilots need to be in the plane?

If they're in the plane, they have a greater incentive to land it safely - which is why I want a pilot on board with me.

This kind of seems reasonable, why downvotes?

Please don't post comments about downvotes. They add noise, and typically are soon out of sync with reality.

What about the gigantic incentive to live resulting in poorer performance?

We saw this on Air France - where the pilots' panic caused them to ignore readily available information that would have saved their lives.

On the whole of it, I'd rather the plane be flown by a computer, with a remote pilot jumping in for extreme edge cases.

How about all three? Computer, with a pilot on board monitoring things, and a remote pilot for extreme emergencies.

Someone should be able to physically take some kind of control when the computer pilot breaks and the comm link to the remote pilot doesn't work.

I think this is a good solution, except that experienced pilots will eventually become quite rare after computers take over the job.

Well, that's more or less how it works today. Airline pilot's job is basically hours of boredom punctuated by minutes of terror. Computers do most of the work, pilots are there for takeoffs and landings (which could be automated) but more importantly for when things really go wrong. Airline pilots flying scheduled flights (Part 121) are in constant communication with the dispatcher on the ground. Dispatcher is trained to pretty much the same standard as pilots and helps with the planning, safety and can help with workload during flight. Having all three in place is probably why airline flying is so safe these days.

On the other hand, I could see freighters (e.g. likes of FedEx fleet) fully automated in the near future (5 years? less?)

Here is a less radical question: if the plane was capable of flying itself, do two pilots have to be in the plane? Could we get away with just one pilot and still be at sufficient redundancy?

And if the pilot had nothing to do, how the heck would they not go mad from boredom?

There have been many incidents where it took both pilots to save the airplane.

The point is not the past, but the future. There is a point where one pilot is reasonable, then none; so when will we get to 1p?

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