amen brother, totally agree. If they want to use a drone, they must at least understand airspace they operate in, and must have the same equipment as any other operator using that airspace as well. I have seen more and more drones, often very close to ORD and PWK, over congested areas, over open assemblies of people, in firework shows, at concerts, hovering around high rise apartments probably spying on people getting dressed.... I think drones are a lot of fun, but it's gotten way out of control. On youtube people are openly posting flights climbing through clouds to "VFR on Top" hovering.... all around airports... it's just a matter of time until one of the heavier ones that has a Sony F55, Alexa, or Red Epic comes through the windscreen and kills a pilot, or turns an engine into a camera grinder.. with camera+gear well over 35 pounds with dense metal parts... yeah, something really bad is gonna happen some day, I hope not, but the "big sky" philosophy has been proven not

(Written on 10/08/2015)(Permalink)

i wonder if the taddle tale feels better about themselves now? to go out of their way to turn her in for basically enjoying her job. i hope the little a hole gets a kidney stone. i had one. this idiot deserves it!

(Written on 07/13/2015)(Permalink)

I'd love to know what it's capabilities are and what it's is doing up there for several hundred days in a row. Vandenberg is the preferred base for NSA and CIA and the R eat of the intelligence alphabet soup. Some say it is simply a surveillance vehicle that unlike satellites can be unpredictable and catch those who avoid the regular satellites. Others say it has anti satellite weaponry. Maybe both. Maybe neither. I wish they would tell us what the big secret it. God knows our enemies know the secret. So not telling us pretty much only keeps the people in the dark. If spies were able to sneak secrets out of the Manhattan project which had much less peoe involved - "they" must know exactly what it's capable of by now. I hate all this secrecy. So many things are "top secret" or "eyes only".

(Written on 04/02/2015)(Permalink)

agreed - but including 9/11 in a list of intentional aircraft crashes makes sense. You can't call them accidents either for that matter./

(Written on 03/31/2015)(Permalink)

so secret there is a press release about it. I think it's great to have drones providing internet access in remote areas. But I fear the power Facebook or google would have with their finger on the trigger - able to shut down an entire region's internet access if for example it wanted to shut down a potential competition.... or ability to unplug an area from the rest of the word. Companies have that ability now. but it's more entailed. but solely relying on this type of system seems like a scary idea.... especially Facebook or google meet with the white house o a regular basis.

(Written on 03/31/2015)(Permalink)

Dreaming? I am not dreaming... I have no vested interest in the company or the technology. Despite calling on you to just agree to disagree and having not put words in your mouth or act superior you still feel the need to be condescending... So this will be my final message to you, and no matter what your response is - I will not answer (so you can have the last word) Moore's Law - I am sure you heard about it before and after a brief search on Google or Wikipedia it'll start to seem familiar to you. But hardware is not the only advancement, robotics and artificial intelligence is advancing at such a pace that it is absolutely impossible to accurately predict just how far and fast our lives will be impacted by changing technology. Would you really have believed 50 years ago that UAV's would not only be taking over so many recon. missions but would be trusted with live ordinance? No one thought that would be possible. Now google is working hard to get a completely autonomous passe

(Written on 03/08/2015)(Permalink)

Ken, There is a huge difference between flying pax autonomously vs an autonomous tug. There is no reason for you to keep expanding the conversation to more than what this article and in fact what I have written. You've done that when you tried to turn my low vis taxi into a zero visibility taxi, and now again with your comment "without someone to monitor". I never said no one would monitor, in fact, I very clearly stated that I can see a ground tower with a HUD type of overlay for just that purpose. We pilots can stick our heads in the ground like an ostrich whenever the topic of AI and Unmanned systems comes up, or we can engage the topic fully. Whether we like it or not automation has already cut the flight crew by 1/3 with EFIS systems taking over the FE position. Ground automation is a very real possibility, especially once fuel prices skyrocket again (which they will someday). This type of tug operating autonomously will be especially useful for wide body aircraft whi

(Written on 03/08/2015)(Permalink)

I never said zero vis - I didn't say it was too low for taxiing either - I simply said low vis taxi. There is no need to exaggerate what I said. Not enough room? nonsense. Prove that it is a huge money-saver for the airlines and you'll see that where there is a will there is a way... or should I say "where there is money there is a way" It wouldn't be very hard at all with it's low profile! "a driver will always be required" you say - I completely disagree. AI "artificial intelligence" is very real, and if applied correctly could very well be used to replace a driver. If aircraft can be flown without a pilot, and a car can be driven without a driver (with many more obstacles and variables) a tug can be driven without a driver,,, EASILY There will most likely be ground coordinators to assign duties to the automated tugs, assigning them to specific aircraft and where to bring them. I can see a ground control tower with a touch sensitive HUD system that allows them to touch

(Written on 03/07/2015)(Permalink)

When Avantair went out of business it got rid of all those passengers and pilots - so I guess it was only logical to turn the P180 into a drone! LOL

(Written on 03/07/2015)(Permalink)

I can't believe the negativity about this system. Especially for wide body aircraft it makes sense. When the price of Jet-A skyrockets this type of system will be very cost effective. I would like to see this vehicle run autonomously so that no safety driver would be required. Low Visibility taxiing especially when unfamiliar to the airport, runway incursion avoidance, fuel savings, flight crew can do other tasks while it drives itself. It drives itself back to the gate or to next aircraft. Seems like a great idea - In fact, I was talking about something similar back in 2007 and everyone seemed to think ti was a great idea.

(Written on 03/07/2015)(Permalink)