You Can't Make This Stuff Up

[Polish_Silver]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up

I don't think it's ever a problem for the man, since he always has the option of keeping quiet. The woman however,
cannot choose to divorce, or avoid it if the husband so chooses. About as assymetric as it gets.

[Polish_Silver]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up

The last sentence caught my attention. Recently a friend who does handy work on side and works for the tsa doing safety checks on planes was not saying kind things of this sequestration. He will be losing one day a week without pay which will cost him 2k a month supporting 2 children. His anxiousness is what first grabs your attention and his will to survive. Second, is with my travel at times in 60 to 70 percent range, I'd rather have him and all tsa safety employees working overtime not less with the current state of our airline industry.

Oh, and we’re also cutting the air traffic control budget by nine percent. That should have some interesting consequences.

TSA are the guys who watch you walk through the X-ray machines. They are cutting air traffic controllers.

The control tower technology gets upgraded from time to time, perhaps gradually reducing the number of people needed.

Just as cockpit crews went from 3 to 2 about 15 years ago, I think.

[jpetr48]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up

my mistake- he was an inspector for FAA- thanks for correcting.
when you travel as much as i do it all blends into two words- "safe travel"

What concerns me is their low profitability combined with my conversations with flight attendants asking about the state of the airline.
Both are not a flattering picture. I have worked for companies driven by cost structure alone. Cutting back FAA inspections and possibly airlines cutting corners is troublesome. Keep in mind i cant prove airlines are cutting corners but i do know human nature without accountability.

here is article on state of profits for airlines
http://centreforaviation.com/analysi...-anaemic-85722

[Polish_Silver]

risk vs profits

my mistake- he was an inspector for FAA- thanks for correcting.
when you travel as much as i do it all blends into two words- "safe travel"

What concerns me is their low profitability combined with my conversations with flight attendants asking about the state of the airline.
Both are not a flattering picture. I have worked for companies driven by cost structure alone. Cutting back FAA inspections and possibly airlines cutting corners is troublesome. Keep in mind i cant prove airlines are cutting corners but i do know human nature without accountability.

here is article on state of profits for airlines
http://centreforaviation.com/analysi...-anaemic-85722

It has been that way for 40 years, if not longer. My father was a mechanic at united airlines and he griped occasionally about how the company would cut corners on maintenance to save a buck or to get a flight out on time.
(I don't remember him saying that it got worse with de-regulation.)

One example he gave was the pre-flight check list. The mechanic can do this, but he has to go to the cockpit, and verify that the controls and instruments are oK. This takes time, and can mean that a flight is delayed. Some guys would sign the check list without checking anything. My father said the company loved them because the flights went out on time.

I am not saying United was worse than others.

Remember that air travel is about 10X safer than car travel, per passenger mile. The airplanes have many redundant communication and control systems. The pilots are highly trained and screened for physical and mental health.


Off the top of my head, I can think of several airlines cutting corners which caused airplane crashes.

The worst case was Alaska Airlines. They did not lubricate the jack screw on one plane. That meant that the horizontal stabilizer (tail) got stuck in "dive" position (Just like Denzel Washington in "Flight"). I think that crash killed everyone.

In another case, the mechanic re-used the screws that hold the window glass to the cockpit. The window came out during the flight, and the pilot got sucked out the window. His feet caught the frame, and the cabin crew held his ankles . The co-pilot was able to land the plane, and casualties were minimal.

With all that, I am much more worried about car travel than plane travel.

[lektrode]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up

TSA are the guys who watch you walk through the X-ray machines.

which are unionized???

They are cutting air traffic controllers. ....

who are not?

that would explain things nicely, assuming its true...

[GRG55]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up

TSA are the guys who watch you walk through the X-ray machines. They are cutting air traffic controllers.

The control tower technology gets upgraded from time to time, perhaps gradually reducing the number of people needed.

Just as cockpit crews went from 3 to 2 about 15 years ago, I think.

It's not just technology in the control towers that is changing. There's some transformative changes under way in the USA air system now with the FAA's NextGen Air Traffic Control system program. Probably the most notable current area of change is automatic dependent surveillance - broadcast (ADS-B). By Jan 1, 2020 every airplane operating in controlled airspace in the USA must be equipped with ADS-B technology that will broadcast its location, altitude and track. All other aircraft in the area will receive this information and plot the position of every other aircraft, as will controllers on the ground. This is replacing the ground based radar system that the government maintains and distributes the responsibility for position information sourcing to aircraft owners instead. Although it's going to cost airplane owners like me some money, it is going to be another important step to enhance flight safety.

I've seen some demos of ADS-B units and not only do they plot other aircraft position on the cockpit display, but the more advanced ones have computer algorithms that will take the altitude, track and calculated speed information and forecast on screen where those airplanes will be in relation to your own over the coming seconds and minutes, so a pilot or controller can tell instantly which are diverging and which are converging (& potential threats).

Airframe technology advances are now small increments; and a lot of those are in the materials technologies. If you design an airplane today for a certain mission (payload, range, etc.) it won't look much different from the existing airplanes fulfilling that mission. Let's face it, a Boeing 787 Dreamliner doesn't look radically different from a 30 year old Boeing 767. Ditto for propulsion technologies.

All the really dramatic changes in aviation are happening in avionics, and this is going to radically change the way in which we manage airspace and flight control.

[Polish_Silver]

The lonely cockpit

It's not just technology in the control towers that is changing. There's some transformative changes under way in the USA air system now with the FAA's NextGen Air Traffic Control system program.. Although it's going to cost airplane owners like me some money, it is going to be another important step to enhance flight safety.

I've seen some demos of ADS-B units and not only do they plot other aircraft position on the cockpit display, but the more advanced ones have computer algorithms that will take the altitude, track and calculated speed information and forecast on screen where those airplanes will be in relation to your own over the coming seconds and minutes, so a pilot or controller can tell instantly which are diverging and which are converging (& potential threats).



All the really dramatic changes in aviation are happening in avionics, and this is going to radically change the way in which we manage airspace and flight control.

My brother is a pilot at Southest. I discussed the possibility of having a single pilot in the cockpit, and he agreed that it was possible, but it might take a long time. The reason is not a specific technological hurdle, but the difficulty of defining a system which mediates complex human-human communication and human-airplane control. He said that currently, both pilots are needed at take off and landing. One of them flies the plane, the other does the control tower communication and check list. Some of this communication is already automated on international flights. It is sent via the radio to the control tower from the planes instruments, without a pilot having to read and speak the information.

Embraer is claiming thier latest generation does much of this automatically---shortening the check list greatly, and moving towards a single pilot system.

I think the planes of the future will have one pilot in the cockpit, one "auxilliary pilot" on the ground, and a sophisticated autopilot. Planes have been flying solo since the beginning of aviation. What has not happened yet is a multi-engine jet taking off and and landing in crowded airspace with just one pilot.

As an example of how far things have come, consider this Concorde cockpit.

It looks like you would need about 5 people in there to handle all that stuff. And it also looks like the visibility sucks.

[globaleconomicollaps]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up

Airframe technology advances are now small increments; and a lot of those are in the materials technologies. If you design an airplane today for a certain mission (payload, range, etc.) it won't look much different from the existing airplanes fulfilling that mission. Let's face it, a Boeing 787 Dreamliner doesn't look radically different from a 30 year old Boeing 767. Ditto for propulsion technologies.

All the really dramatic changes in aviation are happening in avionics, and this is going to radically change the way in which we manage airspace and flight control.

Check this out:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonov_An-70

This is the future of aviation. It is a cross between a propeller plane and a jet.

[Polish_Silver]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up

does it save fuel?

[GRG55]

Re: The lonely cockpit

...Embraer is claiming thier latest generation does much of this automatically---shortening the check list greatly, and moving towards a single pilot system...

...What has not happened yet is a multi-engine jet taking off and and landing in crowded airspace with just one pilot...

Happens all the time.

But not with commercial service paying passengers.

Single pilot executive jets have been around for some time, and have no problem in crowded airspace. But they are in private service, not commercial paying passenger service where the rules are different. As your brother will confirm it's all about the Flight Management System helping to manage the single pilot IFR workload.

I have a corporate pilot friend and one of the planes he flies as a solo pilot is a Citation Mustang jet. He flew it from western Canada across the Atlantic, all over Europe including Paris, and then to North Africa and back last fall.

I believe Embraer's Phenom 300 is the largest executive jet currently certified to be flown legally with a single pilot in private service.

[Polish_Silver]

50 year old babes

Washington state woman may be charged with killing boyfriend with her breasts

A 50-year-old woman from Everett, Wash., is facing possible manslaughter charges after police say she smothered and killed her boyfriend with her breasts...

...The incident is similar to a November case in which a German lawyer claimed his girlfriend tried to kill him by holding his head between her 38DD breasts...

...He claimed his girlfriend later admitted on the phone that she'd been trying to smother him — saying she wanted his death "to be as pleasurable as possible."

I'd like to meet this woman.

[shiny!]

Re: 50 year old babes

I'd like to meet this woman.

Thinking with your...

[lektrode]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up

The last sentence caught my attention. Recently a friend who does handy work on side and works for the tsa doing safety checks on planes was not saying kind things of this sequestration. He will be losing one day a week without pay which will cost him 2k a month supporting 2 children. His anxiousness is what first grabs your attention and his will to survive. Second, is with my travel at times in 60 to 70 percent range, I'd rather have him and all tsa safety employees working overtime not less with the current state of our airline industry.

and herein lies the SCAM of the year/decade/century of the obama sequester:

the amount to be "slashed" amounts to what - 3% of the budget (which is also merely a cut to the INCREASE in the budget?)

so why arernt the wages/ops budgets being cut across the board BY 3% ?

pure beltway (democrat) theater, as per usual: cut what the public sees first

[GRG55]

Re: You Can't Make This Stuff Up - Saudi Arabia Segregates Bankers

PCS (Peak Cheap Swordsmen)??

Saudi executes 7 convicted of armed robbery

RIYADH—Saudi Arabia on Wednesday executed seven men convicted of armed robbery despite last-minute appeals by international rights groups that their lives be spared, a witness in the southern city of Abha said.

The execution was “implemented a while ago at a public square in Abha,” the witness told Agence France-Presse by telephone, adding that the defendants were “shot dead” and not beheaded as is customary in the kingdom...

...Executions in Saudi Arabia, which applies a strict interpretation of Islamic sharia law, are generally carried out by beheading but media reports said authorities were considering using firing squads due to lack of swordsmen...

[stetts]

Hahahahahaha!

GRG55,
I believe I've enjoyed your posts more than any on this site. (I'm an engineer as well, but possess no where near your expertise.) You said, "There's some transformative changes under way in the USA air system now with the FAA's NextGen Air Traffic Control system program. Probably the most notable current area of change is automatic dependent surveillance - broadcast (ADS-B). By Jan 1, 2020 every airplane operating in controlled airspace in the USA must be equipped with ADS-B technology that will broadcast its location, altitude and track." which set my BS detector into high PRF. (Pulse Rate Frequency. When a missile homes in, it's radar changes frequency from low rate search radar to high rate homing. Missile warning systems in my helicopter, Radar Homing and Warning System, or RHAW, would provide an audible alarm to the crew, hence, the analogy. I won't define BS.)
Anyway, as early as 1980 FAA was alleging transformative changes by intending to remove from service all ADF's, VORs, VORTACs and TACANs. The idea was solely GPS area navigation and ILS terminal navigation. I guess we're now on a different, but somewhat mobile tranformation? Whatever the FAA's outcome, the cost is measured in billions and the progress in inches. Not sure if those are positive or negative inches.
Thanks for the update. BTW, isn't there something already that broadcasts the plane's position, altitude, speed and direction to Air Traffic Control? Lemme see....oh yeah, called a transponder. We had them, both open and secure mode, back in Vietnam. Just sayin'.
Thanks for the chuckle. Stetts