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The contractors just took the funding and spent it on parties, gifts, holidays and home renovations?
So builders of UAV, USV, UGS, UMS grants just did nothing for the past years?
No more thinking about the Unmanned Systems Integrated Roadmap?
"Pentagon Issues 25-Year Unmanned Systems Roadmap" (January 3, 2014)
https://www.ainonline.com/avia...

Except that it's Samsung with the exploding batteries. But any chance to act like a shitknob and bash Apple because you lack any real intelligence or character, right?

The article did specifically cite an iPad and an iPhone 6S as being stowed in the spot where the fire started, as well as bottles of perfume. If the perfume had a high enough alcohol content, a shattered bottle could feed the fire from an exploding battery.

Although Apple device explosions are rare, they have happened, especially in reduced atmospheric pressure:
http://www.ainonline.com/aviat...

I expect to see pod-planes for general cargo before 2025.

You already have this today. Here's a typical 747 cargo-pod configuration:

https://www.ups.com/aircargo/i...

Here are the pods going in:

http://www.ainonline.com/sites...

In the case of nearly all private pilots, however, the moment they leave the runway they are on someone's radar. If they haven't filed a flight plan, the FAA will know within minutes.

That doesn't exactly mean what you're implying. For VFR (non-instrument) flights you're not required to file a flight plan or talk to anyone in uncontrolled airspace. They might see you on radar, but with a generic transponder code of 1200 they have no idea who you are. There's actually a bit of controversy regarding this anonymity as it relates to a law which will require a new type of transponder (ADS-B) by 2020. The new transponders send what amounts to a MAC address which is unique, causing some privacy concerns.

*edit*

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UPS_Airlines_Flight_6

a scattering of other incidents, and some controversy.

Apparently, bulk containers of Li-ion batteries have been witnessed catching fire on the ground during loading, are suspected of having taken down a few cargo aircraft, and are believed to burn in a manner that defies standard Halon flood fire suppression. However(due at least in part to the fact that 'being in a burning aircraft' is one of the conditions likely to cause a battery to catch fire) there is some controversy over how frequently the batteries were the root cause, and how frequently they just got caught up in the spirit of the occasion.

They do become unusable when you drop the stack of papers and they scatter... or if you set them on fire. Or if you spill your coffee on them.

If you've got a fire in the cockpit, there's probably bigger things to worry about in the short term than the loss of some documentation.

It's a good thing that iPads can't catch fire or explode.

Very light jets!

2006: The year of the very light jet

Very Light Jet Magazine

The Light Jet Age

OK, so they are a $1-2 million. That's a lot of money. From what I've read, however, these jet packs aren't that cheap either. (They're not mass produced so the price hasn't dropped at all.) If you bought part of a jet as a time share, with say 20-50 other people, the price drops significantly. It is a viable option for some people.

Our government officials are probably just worried that China would try the same tricks that we were using against them.

Bugged 767s

And yes, I'm an expert on Navigation systems in Aircraft. Or at least I was throughout the late 80's and early 90's. I don't think anything has really changed in the last decade though.

And yes, I'm an expert on Navigation systems in Aircraft. Or at least I was throughout the late 80's and early 90's. I don't think anything has really changed in the last decade though.

I have and and again it pails in regards to EU countries, not only is it the crazy big stuff you mention but look at the immense amount of protectionism pervasive into everything.

And hey lets take France and spying, you opened it and let me throw a big old stinker right back at you.

http://www.ainonline.com/issues/01_04/01_04_spying p66.html
Far more common, experts say, is the type of spying done by government intelligence agencies, the information from which can often end up directly helping companies in the countries doing the spying. The U.S. government, for example, denies engaging in any type of industrial espionage, but it admits that the intelligence it collects has in the past helped U.S. companies. Probably the most well known example of such activity took place in early 1994, when France's Prime Minister flew to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to put the finishing touches on what he and his government thought was a blockbuster deal for Airbus airliners. Instead, the official was rebuffed by the Saudi government, which turned around and announced it was awarding the coveted contract to Boeing instead.

The reason? At the time the Airbus deal was being pieced together, the U.S. National Security Agency, using its high-tech communication spy network, allegedly had been intercepting faxes and telephone calls among the Saudi government, the Saudi national airline and Airbus. In the course of these "routine" espionage activities, NSA agents are alleged to have discovered that Airbus officials were offering bribes to a Saudi government official. The NSA reportedly passed the information to U.S. officials, who intervened with the Saudi government, which in turn arrested the Saudi government official and broke off negotiations with Airbus. The New York Times and NBC News jumped on the story, which the NSA, rather than trying to cover up, admitted was all true, calling it a "win" for the U.S. aerospace industry.

Based on what is already known about government-espionage activities, billions of dollars' worth of commerce has in effect been siphoned from bidders in certain countries and handed to those in other nations. In addition, government spies allegedly pilfer vast amounts of technology-related data each year and hand it over to companies in their own countries. The New York Times, for example, reported that between 1987 and 1989 French intelligence planted moles at a number of high-tech companies in the U.S., including IBM, whose alleged job it was to steal technology to aid France's computer industry. In fall 1991, according to the paper, a French intelligence team also allegedly attempted to steal stealth aircraft technology from Lockheed, an effort that was successfully thwarted only after the FBI learned of the plot.

No we don't have an An-124, it's the largest plane currently flying, built by the russians partly as an expression of national pride, and it cost shitloads. Only flies a few times a year btw, not a lot of people need that much lifting power.

They were built to carry miscellaneous military and civilian equipment like a couple of tanks or Buran buster. They fly every day, and carry anything from Sony Playstations to US military shipments to Afganistan. Volga-Dnepr Airlines has 10 An-124's in active use. New An-124 would not cost more than 80 millions of dollars - this can be hardly described as "shitloads" for the plane of its size. You might try to tell american military or u.s. companies like General Electric and Lockheed-Martin that they do not need this kind of lifting power, though they are not likely to listen to your advice.

So please stop being an idiot, and do not bullshit me and everybody on matters you have no slightest idea about.

The FAA ADS-B program has been running for a while including free flight with terrain following maps for improved safety.

http://www.ainonline.com/issues/12_01/12_01_alaska nadsbprojpg3.html

If you dont believe him, there here ya go:

Connexion by Boeing airborne Internet in airline service
Its primarily EU airlines that have so far started using Connexion, while the US airlines lag far behind, so its no surprise that it would be in use on Airbus aircraft.

It seems that Honda is making an airplane

Ironic, eh?

For telephone conversations that are broadcast outside of American jurisdiction: Yes, it is routine.

Do you recall when the hot-head Chinese pilot rammed the US reconnaissance plane three years ago? (Or, when the hot-head US pilot rammed the Chinese fighter plane, depending on which part of the world you live in.) What, exactly, do you think the tens of millions of dollars worth of signal processing computers on that plane were being used for? Why do you think the Chinese (and other countries) were so upset about our electronic reconnaissance? It's not because they're afraid we might get tapes of some doofus telling his mistress that he wishes he was a tampon so he could live in her pants.

And, if you believe this type of reconnaissance is done entirely for national security, you are badly mistaken.

I wonder how much this has to do with the warned pilot shortage, as many retire over the next few years.

Probably everything.

Several relatively faint satellite signals on a limited range of frequencies that are relatively easy to isolate and disrupt (hell, a simple steel box will jam a GPS device if you physically have access to it-- it doesn't take a high-tech solution.)

See this article from Aviation International News (or just do a Google search).

As far as GPS-jamming goes, the top-level poster made a perfectly reasonable point. However, I don't think that it's much of a solution, as the authorities will soon notice the constant lack of information from your box and come over to investigate.

Using the inverse-square law, this implies that a kilowatt transmitter could disrupt GPS over an area of about 1,500 miles in radius. Admittedly, line-of-sight limitations would probably make a wide-range jammer impractical unless you could get it to altitude as you suggest -- but in any case, it would hardly take a nuclear EMP to impact the efficacy of the GPS system over a large portion of Europe.

Here's one other thought-provoking item, from Aviation International News:

Carroll also stressed the danger of "spoofing," where false GPS signals could slowly divert an aircraft off track, undetected by the pilot. This could be hazardous during an approach. Current civil receiver designs cannot counter spoofing and few provide immediate failure warnings, Carroll noted, so he proposed that new certification standards be developed. (full story)

Re - "FAA regs against using 'anything that sends or receives a signal'"

It's actually not an FAA rule. It's FCC. The FCC forbids using a cellphone from any platform not attached to the ground.

It's against FCC rules to use a phone from a hot-air baloon, and from parachutes - both of which are not regulated by the FAA.

Both the FCC and FAA websites suck, but here's a pretty interesting article. The rule is in FCC reg 22.925 - maybe somebody else will have better luck finding the text.

The nutshell is that the problem hasn't got anything do to with interference with navigation, but rather interference with ground systems. Cellphone just weren't designed to be able to "see" so many different cell towers.

_Am