The Times

[joepai]

Be thankful we do not live in Pakistan !

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/worl ... -nkdwj8gxs

[noosard]

Probably proves airline pilots are over paid bus drivers

[mickojak]

Noos,
That's a bit unfair.
When a bus engine stops, just get out.
A plane falls 30,000 feet.

Pilots need a couple more skills, I think

[noosard]

I suppose so, someone has to push the auto pilot button
Poor old bus driver has to stay awake
or should stay awake

[tamada]

Noos,
That's a bit unfair.
When a bus engine stops, just get out.
A plane falls 30,000 feet.

Pilots need a couple more skills, I think

Commercial airline pilots need no more than to be able to eat one-handed while they check their FB on a tablet. Once take-off and landing can be safely automated (and it's only ancient, creaking pilots unions that prevent a whole slew of safe, mil spec automation to be introduced commercially), the buggers will be totally redundant. They can go down the back and turn on the prepackaged food and drinks vending machines and make the coffee.

[jackspratt]

Meanwhile, back in 737-MAX land.

[mickojak]

When engine, or engines stop, forget auto pilot, it's all on you.
Also, thunderstorms, wind sheer, instrument failure etc.
Also, like 737-max computer problems.

Like all professionals, they don't get paid for 90% of what they do, it's the 10% unexpected or specialist area, where they earn their keep.

If you want a bus driver to fly your plane, let me know, so I can get the next flight.

[tamada]

Like planes are on the point of falling out of the sky daily due to engine failures, storms and the like?

The aberration called 737 MAX with two fatal crashes that experienced pilots couldn't prevent.

More air accidents are attributed to pilot error than the airlines, unions and insurers would care to admit.

Let them work from home if they're that essential.

[noosard]

BTW Mick i was only joking about pilots being over paid bus drivers

[mickojak]

BTW Mick i was only joking about pilots being over paid bus drivers

55

For Tam,
I was on a plane once that dropped 10,000ft.
Trust me, I was happy to have pilots

[tamada]

^ I bet you were happy that you had bought underdags with strong elastic too! Glad you made it though.

I get your point that abnormal circumstances typically require rapid human intervention. Case in point was the BA 747 that lost all four engines in the volcanic dust cloud over Indonesia. The pilot and crew were hero's for gliding while getting some of the engines restarted. That was quite a while ago and I would think that advanced AI could detect power loss, assert optimum glide configuration and work on restarting the engines. Pilotless flight isn't new.

[mickojak]

Pilotless flight isn't new.

Correct, but I can't imagine anyone getting on a pilotless plane any time soon, certainly not me

Another time, we were landing in Auckland and I was sitting facing a hostess.
The plane was all over the place and she was as white as a ghost.
After landing, I asked her how that compares to other scary landings.
She told me that one was the worst she had had in her 8 years service, by a long shot.

I certainly have a great appreciation for planes, and pilots.
They can both handle a lot

[tamada]

My scariest was a couple of years back in an ATR turboprop in northern Myanmar. We boarded quickly trying to take off ahead of a quickly moving storm front. Taxi'd to the end of the runway but had to hold nose-in to the electric storm ripping through. It was very rough with the plane shaking and bouncing about as it sat on the tarmac. We reckoned if the plane had remained beam-on to the storm at the terminal, the plane could easily have been flipped.

After about 5 minutes, the storm clears on down the runway, plane does a 180, ready for take off. Off we go and just as the wheels are retracting, we start banking heavily and fly into the back-end of the same storm! Baggage lockers popping open, a few pax with loose seatbelts using their heads to open them and this terrible prolonged wailing of the ladies (and probably a few blokes) in the cabin. Truly ass-puckering stuff for maybe 3 minutes until we peeled out of the storm at around 500 m. I had a window seat and couldn't even see the engines and no idea in what direction we were headed. Maybe that pilot could have waited just 5 minutes longer before taking off?

Strong underpants!

[mickojak]

Strong underpants!

I've got some stories from Nepal and Papua New Guinea too.
Lucky I'm still alive, really.

But, as for happy events, a group of us got medevaced out of the Himilaya's in a old army chopper. (Lucky I wasn't the one sick).
The chopper had trouble taking off because of the altitute and shook like hell all the way back to Pokara.
But, it was an amazing flight coming down one of the valleys following the river.
Was the sort of flight tourists would pay thousands for.
A truly unforgettable experience.
Only partially soiled pants on that one