On Sun, 02 Apr 2006 16:54:53 +0000, Larry Dighera wrote:

UAVs can't even see and avoid other aircraft; how are crop dusting UAVs
going to avoid things like electrical wires, etc?

BTW, I've read this here before and I don't understand why UAV "pilots"
don't have vision in all directions combined with active traffic
avoidance (seeing even just primary targets). With a wearable HUD,
bandwidth, and sufficiently smart processing, a UAV "pilot" should have
*better* see&avoid capabilities than we do.

More, ground-based RADAR should be yet another input to the "pilot".

[...]

Refueling is an interesting mission for UAVs. How difficult would it be
for terrorists to monitor the radio control signals, duplicate them, and
seize control of a heavily fuel laden unmanned aircraft?

I'd hope that the traffic would be encrypted.

Jamming would be a more realistic threat, I'd opine. But isn't that
enough of a problem?

[...]

What would be the per-seat cost savings to passengers willing to climb
aboard a pilotless airliner? Is there any justification for UAVs in
this mission other than economic? Is that sufficient to justify the
hazard to the public created by UAVs?

I can imagine some advantages. For example, consider that Egyptian (?)
flight that a pilot flew into an ocean a few years back. On one hand,
this becomes easier for a non-suicidal pilot to achieve. But the pilot
under this model is operating in an environment with many others (or so
one would presume). There's far better opportunity to smack a killer pilot
on the head and have someone else take over the plane.

There are also training implications, but I'm not sure how significant
this would be. Choose some tough airport approach, train a few pilots to
be perfect in that approach, and then they always fly it. Any airplane
about to transition from en route to approach to that airport gets handed
over to one of these "specialists".

Is all this worth the threat of jamming (natural or man-made)? I'd not
think so. We've seen traffic snarls when an ATC facility has gone down.
Imagine the havoc if a "remote piloting" facility goes down!

[...]
So in the opinion of FAA officials there is no need for UAV operators to
prove that they can safely operate in the NAS? Pilots have prove they
can't. That's a ridiculous attitude for the federal agency tasked with
making flight safe. The very least that Congress should mandate is that
the UAV operators bear _sole_ responsibility for an Mid Air Collision
that may occur.

What would that possibly mean? If I'm dead from a midair with a UAV, what
difference does it make to me if the UAV operator is held "responsible"?

[Unless by "responsible" you mean "dropped from an airplane w/o a chute".]

- Andrew