When it comes to aviation, the United States leads in safety and technology.  We benefit from some of the most innovative aviation companies in the world, research participation with NASA, DARPA and other agencies.  We have intense safety oversight from the FAA, NTSB, Homeland Security, and numerous local agencies.  Airline companies and employee unions have tremendous focus on training and a safe work environment, as well as the safety of passengers.

It is too bad that, in many ways, aviation infrastructure advances at a snail’s pace.  While the world adopts amazing technologies, the airlines and aviation infrastructure seem locked in the Age of the Dinosaurs.  In some ways, those involved in the system may be too close to understand how primitive things are.  After all, it takes an amazing amount of training for pilots to learn how to deal with air traffic control, the antiquated Flight Service Stations, or radio communications.  Pilots that complete their training become indoctrinated into procedures and technologies that originated in the 1930s and 1940s.

Let’s go through two simple problems that can be easily addressed today.  Because the solutions are simple, experienced aviation professionals will be able to easily come up with complex reasons why the solution must be complex and expensive.  I reject that thinking. Aviation has abandoned reasonable, direct problem solutions and suffered for too long.

The first problem is cabin safety in airliners.  From terrorist attacks to rowdy passengers, or perhaps abusive flight attendants, there are a lot of things that can happen in the passenger cabin that affect the safety of flight and passengers.  There is a very simple, helpful thing that can be done in this area.  Many school systems put video cameras on their buses that cover the passenger areas.  They have been very helpful on many occasions.  Considering the closed door at the cockpit, I’m sure the flight crew would appreciate additional insight into passenger cabins events in many emergency situations.  Simple, easy, cheap.

The second problem is more complex, but it still has an easy solution.  Just Wednesday a Northwest Airlines passenger flight overflew its destination. Pilots did not respond to air traffic control radio calls for at least an hour.  Recently, a general aviation aircraft collided with a helicopter over the Hudson River in New York, killing everyone on board both aircraft.  Poor air traffic control communication handoff was a factor in that accident.  Every day, where air traffic is dense near major airports, air traffic control communications are dropped as aircraft transit numerous air control sectors and pilots are required to switch radio frequencies while handling a variety of difficult tasks.  Often the most difficult task, watching for other traffic in crowded airspace, loses out to frequency juggling.

It is worthwhile to ask why, in this day and age, a pilot under high workload conditions has to deal with radio frequency assignments.  Why does air traffic control have to waste time confirming that an aircraft has properly changed the frequency?  Why does air traffic control have to suffer from juggling several aircraft on the same frequency, dealing with channel hogs, and the possibility of missed communication when lives are at stake?  Because that’s the way it was done in 1935? 

Folks, we are in an age of cell phones when everyone has one or two of these puppies in their pocket. Everyone has one or more “telephone numbers” that directly address a little radio called a cell phone.  These things send text messages and large digital files like cell phone pictures.  Why can’t a plane have one that air traffic control can call?  If the flight crew doesn’t respond on the traditional radio, just call them!  Better yet, just use the air phone all the time.  No need to hand off frequencies, everyone talks direct.  If the pilot wants local conditions on the field, there’s a button for that (not some special frequency setting).  If the pilot wants to hear nearby traffic (not someone 20 miles away landing at a different airport), there’s a button for that.  If the airplane is really sophisticated, the other aircraft show up on the GPS screen on the panel (because, like expensive ADS-B, cell phones can broadcast their GPS coordinates).  Sure, the “air phones” would need some tailoring to work this way. But this is drop-dead simple compared to hoping for dinosaur evolution in our lifetime.

-- Walter Lounsbery, 10-24-2009

This is just a test post to check Live Writer setup after rebuilding my work station.