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Moderate parent UP! Seems correct to me.

Orion Spacecraft. Quote: "... is building...".

Boeing Starliner. Quote: "... is being developed...".

Even just giving the dimensions would be helpful. How god damn hard is that to figure out? Here is their fact sheet, which is a ton more helpful than the negative value the author added to this piece.

114 feet tall by 1614 feet wide by 3500 feet long. In convenient units, that's about ten stories tall, and a third of a mile wide by two thirds of a mile long. That I can picture. And it's fucking huge.

But why is this on /. again?

Fuck you, shill. The "North Carolina" issue is a red herring - you know damned well it's "South Carolina", and you know damned well that's what the other posters were talking about.

https://www.boeing.com/company...

Unions are the only reason workers have any rights at all. Go take your anti-worker drivel and peddle it elsewhere. No one here wants what you're selling.

The "Starliner" spacesuit, developed by Boeing. https://www.boeing.com/feature...

There's more to it that that -- you forgot about the ability to take hills. In this case it was perfectly level ground, but a vehicle rated to tow a 2-ton trailer would have to be able to make it to the top of a decent grade (horsepower) and also be able to safely go back down (brakes).

The rated drawbar pull for a fully-loaded 787 is 17 tons and a Tesla Model X can exert little more than 1 ton (before smoking the tires), so it would have to accelerate rather slowly to be able to do the pull.

dom

They killed all the small private aircraft companies that made small planes with the active help of NTSB.

Baloney. Here's a list that includes nearly five dozen small private aircraft companies that make small planes.

Boeing liked small pesky competitors being killed off.

Not only are the above companies not "killed off," they're not even competitors given that Boeing doesn't make small planes. (Unless you somehow consider private versions of Boeing's 7x7 models "small.")

There's no spacecraft other than SpaceX's at the moment with a downmass capacity in the 100+ pound region.

Soyuz.

Yeah, let us now compare capabilities a 7 year old rocket/ship to another with over 50 years of history. Soyuz can carry three astronauts at most to ISS, and is a single purpose ship.

The post to I was responding was about downmass capacity. The statement was incorrect: Soyuz--as you pointed out-- routinely brings down three astronauts, which is a down mass of a lot more than 100 pounds.

The fact that Soyuz has "over 50 years of history" and Dragon doesn't was not brought up in the statement to which I was responding, so I didn't mention it.

Crew Dragon can carry 7, and also some cargo making the transportation to station cheaper overall.

If we're comparing to vehicles that haven't flown yet, we'd have to also add Boeing CST "Starliner", NASA Orion and Sierra Nevada Dream Chaser, among others

So call the flight suit a flight suit.

Because flight suit is ambiguous just as space suit is also ambiguous. They are not strictly speaking "EVA" suits but they are IVA space suits. To quote Wikipedia

Three types of spacesuits exist for different purposes: IVA (intravehicular activity), EVA (extravehicular activity), and IEVA (intra/extravehicular activity).

Boeing uses the same nomenclature. http://www.boeing.com/features...

They're designed to be used in a vacuum. Therefore space suit is a perfectly acceptable term. Just because a suit isn't an EVA suit doesn't mean it's not also a space suit.

I still have tons of gear I bought at company surplus sales back when I worked in medical imaging design and manufacturing. Some companies even sell their surplus to the general public.

What makes you think there's a bias against internal combustion for aircraft?
There are several projects aimed at using biofuel for jet engines. There have been commercial flights already that were powered in part by biofuels.
The unsolved problem here is the currently very limited supply of biofuels, but that's being worked on as well.

That's right. The major commercial aircraft companies - Boeing and Airbus - never claimed solar was the solution. I myself don't really see the Google plane (cool as it is) as being anything more that that, cool. The It might be the case that you get 15 - 30 times more energy density from jet fuel than do with batteries now, and that the aircraft sheds that weight over its journey but that's now. Planes are built around being able to take off heavy but not land safely that way - that's as much a design around the power source - fuel - as it is a limitation of batter technology. It's design. If the Earth drops fossil fuels completely, the new efficiency competition would still be a level playing field amongst manufacturers. It wouldn't be at all surprising if that was the case too. Noise reduction is also already on the agenda. Older planes were louder. High bypass turbo fans are quieter and they were chosen not just because of new technology but because they are quieter. Sonic booms are a thing of the past for commercial flight.

We never believed we'd have electric cars at competitive prices that can out perform fossil fuel based cars but we do. Tesla have demonstrated that it's very doable. They don't get nippier as they run low like gas powered cars (that shed their fuels weight) but if an aircraft engine powered by batteries can be made more performant, it's just a matter of redesign to allow it to land heavier.

Hybrid, inevitably is the first step:
Boeing are working on Sugar Volt behind the scenes and Airbus are working with Siemens on hybrid planes also.

Sorry, but, direct from Boeing Corp's own pages:
http://www.boeing.com/news/frontiers/archive/2004/february/i_history.html
"People who lean toward math and engineering are certain that 707 was chosen because it is the sine of the angle of wing sweep on a 707. It's not, since the wing sweep is 35 degrees and not 45. However, more people lean toward superstition and feel that the positive connotation of the number seven was the reason it was selected.

The truth is a bit more mundane. Boeing has assigned sequential model numbers to its designs for decades, as have most aircraft manufacturers. Boeing commercial aircraft use their model number as their popular name: Model 40, Model 80, Model 247, Model 307 Stratoliner and Model 377 Stratocruiser."

Boeing disagrees with your assessment. But, then, what would they know about why they gave their plane the 707 moniker.

no one's working on any type of dedicated air to air drone

Sure they are. That's one of the proposals for the Unmanned Carrier-Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike program. Here's some more background on the air-to-air concept for UCLASS. The drones would be commanded from a piloted F-35. Boeing is even experimenting with using the F-16 as a drone.

On the contrary. When you factor in the launch costs, it doesn't make sense to use low grade materials to save a tiny bit of money. Instead, solar panels in space use the best materials available for highest possible efficiency for a given mass and/or volume.

I think you haven't worked on space systems. I worked on a Satellite in the 1980's which went up on the shuttle.

(1) You never launch anything "cutting edge"

(2) Top end solar cells have the same problem as unshielded top end microelectronics

(3) You have to "build heavy" in order to survive the launch without damage

(4) You have to hang them out in space where they *will* be smacked by micrometeorites

Basically, you build the best you can with 6-8 year old "proven" technology, and then you expect that it will be an addition 3-4 years out of date by the time it makes orbit.

The designs we've done for satellite systems all assume multijunction Gallium Arsenide photovoltaic cells; for SPS, we've relaxed that, and made up for efficiency with surface area. It's a launch vs. repair vs. energy density trade-off (this is why Hubble used Silicon photovoltaic cells).

See:

http://www.boeing.com/boeing/h...

See also this paper from the NASA Glenn Research Center, SERT (Space Solar Power Exploratory Research and Technology) program team:
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/n...

I can't say about SpaceX and they already have their Falcon Heavy in the works (which doesn't match the SLS specs), but Boeing is already the prime contractor for most of the SLS vehicle -- "Boeing is the prime contractor for the design, development, test and production of the launch vehicle cryogenic stages, as well as development of the avionics suite." http://www.boeing.com/boeing/d...

Being an old school aerospace contractor, Boeing knows the risks to deliver new, cutting edge space hardware*. I doubt they would take this project on as fixed cost or with a hard delivery date.

*Yeah, I know that SLS doesn't look cutting edge compared to the Saturn V or Space Shuttle, but it's development will be sucha large effort, it might as well be.
Don't take anything I said here as actual approval of how the SLS was conceived and is being done.

They only sold their rockets to the military/NASA,

There are at least two instances where commercial satellites went up in Atlas vehicles. You also misses all the NOAA launches.

Define better. If you say safer = better and go by statistics, Boeing humbly disagrees with you:

The statement regarding aOA display is incorrect. All current production Boeing aircraft can be configured to display current AOA, target AOA, and limitations in the top right corner of the primary flight display. Whether this option is displayed or used depends on the specific airline's operating certificate and FAA approved procedures specific to that airline. http://www.boeing.com/commerci... The illustration above is old, so it does not mention that this feature is also on the 787 ( which i have flown with AOA active) and on the 747-8 ( which I have not flown but have seen the AOA feature used from the jumpseat)

As others have pointed out, Boeing says it is not a theoretical problem ...

"Operators of commercial airplanes have reported numerous cases of portable electronic devices affecting airplane systems during flight. These devices, including laptop and palmtop computers, audio players/recorders, electronic games, cell phones, compact-disc players, electronic toys, and laser pointers, have been suspected of causing such anomalous events as autopilot disconnects, erratic flight deck indications, airplanes turning off course, and uncommanded turns. Boeing has recommended that devices suspected of causing these anomalies be turned off during critical stages of flight (takeoff and landing)."

"Boeing conducted a laboratory and airplane test with 16 cell phones typical of those carried by passengers, to determine the emission characteristics of these intentionally transmitting PEDs. The laboratory results indicated that the phones not only produce emissions at the operating frequency, but also produce other emissions that fall within airplane communication/navigation frequency bands (automatic direction finder, high frequency, very high frequency [VHF] omni range/locator, and VHF communications and instrument landing system [ILS]). Emissions at the operating frequency were as high as 60 dB over the airplane equipment emission limits, but the other emissions were generally within airplane equipment emission limits."

http://www.boeing.com/commerci...

Or maintaining a launch oligopoly funded on the public dollar through to the last decade?

It took two world wars and one cold war to get us to where we are today.
Feel free to complain about the oligopoly, but don't pretend like Boeing, North American, and Douglas were going to build the Saturn V rocket on their own dime.

Or paying a few tens of billions to develop a huge rocket while not paying a few billion to get someone like SpaceX to develop said rocket.

"Or paying a few tens of billions to develop a huge rocket " to who?

Boeing is the prime contractor for the design, development, test and production of the launch vehicle cryogenic stages, as well as development of the avionics suite.

You had a three sentence post and two of them were full of ignorance.

Using your number of 0.001% probability of this crash being something technical, and my estimated value of MH370 of $2.6B, then $26,000. The 777 has a lot of flight hours; if there's a technical problem with it, its a corner-case quirk, not a fundamental design issue. Maybe it doesn't sit well with you, but it is not reasonable to expect 100% safety from any system -- it would be prohibitively expensive.

A 737 costs around $90 million. And a 767 is close to two hundred million.

http://www.calculator.net/btu-...

http://www.boeing.com/boeing/c...

57KW of cooling for a 50 F decrease

Air conditioners can get 2-3 times the amount put in.

20-30KW for cooling.

Heaters generally are 1 more.

15-20KW for heating.

You could power a stationary Boeing 747 on solar. You just could not move it in the air.

Uh, lots of Boeing customers use the Sky interior.

More than 85 percent of Boeing's backlog of more than 3,400 Next-Generation 737s and 737 MAXs will be delivered with the Boeing Sky Interior. The Boeing Sky Interior will be standard on the 737 MAX.

9/11 was only a couple of airplanes.

Turns out 406 Mhz distress radiobeacon ELT's can have GPS built-in. Also "In addition to standard ACARS messages, airlines can install a system sold by Boeing called Airplane Health Management which provides real-time troubleshooting and allows Boeing to monitor the flight as well as the airline."

The situation is not acceptable. Especially in light of two trillion spent on the WoT, the swatification of every department of this government, the abandonnment of civil rights, vacuuming up of data, the treatment of folks at airports, drone strikes on wedding celebrations?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D... http://www.boeing.com/boeing/c...

I'm sure similar arguments were made when the original black boxes were made mandatory on aircraft.

A new Boeing 777-200ER is about $260M. A Canadian has developed an enhanced black box that constantly sends data back to the airline. The cost would be $100,000 which is only 0.04% of the cost of the aircraft and $85,000 more that the boxes they would replace. There would also be satellite data transfer charges which would be only a few thousand dollars for a flight like MH370 or about $20 per passenger on the flight. You could even limit the data transfer to trans oceanic flights to minimize the impact on low cost and domestic carriers.

Of course, all those costs would come down if every new aircraft was equipped like this. I'm sure the families of the MH370 would consider this minimal cost money well spent.

The Russians have sent tourists to the ISS, so why not Virgin Galactic?

The company to look at is Bigelow Aerospace. FYI, this company is partnering with Boeing to build a spacecraft that will carry passengers at a fraction of the price that Space Adventures is currently charging for that opportunity.

As for a microgravity lab, note that NanoRacks already provides this service. They are literally open to anybody willing to use their checkbook to purchase a flight spot. This is no longer the time for theoretical rants, but a time to act and do something as the opportunity is here. At best, all you can do now is to find cheaper ways to get these things to happen or simply take advantage of the opportunities that exist.

If you dig through the links, you'll find that they're developing a free-electron laser: http://www.boeing.com/assets/pdf/defense-space/ic/des/files/DES_overview.pdf I'm pretty amazed that they can get something like that working in a truck. SLAC was converted into a free-electron laser. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-electron_laser. A free electron laser starts as an accelerator and ends up turning into a beam of light; I thought these things had to be huge in order to work.. They were not clear about what they were currently using.. A compact high energy free electron laser opens up a lot of possibilities.

There are a few instances where they have found the specific piece of electronics that were causing problems, and in some cases purchased it from the passenger.

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/aero_10/interfere_textonly.html

1995, 737 airplane.
A passenger laptop computer was reported to cause autopilot disconnects during cruise. Boeing purchased the computer from the passenger and performed a laboratory testing ...

1996/1997, 767 airplane.
Over a period of eight months, Boeing received five reports on interference with various navigation equipment (uncommanded rolls, displays blanking, flight management computer [FMC]/ autopilot/standby altimeter inoperative, and autopilot disconnects) caused by passenger operation of a popular handheld electronic game device. In one of these cases, the flight crew confirmed the interference by turning the unit on and off to observe the correlation.

1998, 747 airplane.
A passengerâ(TM)s palmtop computer was reported to cause the airplane to initiate a shallow bank turn. One minute after turning the PED off, the airplane returned to "on course." When the unit was brought to the flight deck, the flight crew noticed a strong correlation by turning the unit back on and watching the anomaly return, then turning the unit off and watching the anomaly stop. Boeing was not able to purchase the actual PED...

Funny thing, all the cases of problems caused weren't cell phones.

Farther down the page, they discuss cell phones. They do put out more noise on critical frequencies, sometimes over what the FAA permits for the aircraft itself. In testing, none actually caused problems.

Boeing conducted a laboratory and airplane test with 16 cell phones typical of those carried by passengers, to determine the emission characteristics of these intentionally transmitting PEDs. The laboratory results indicated that the phones not only produce emissions at the operating frequency, but also produce other emissions that fall within airplane communication/navigation frequency bands ... Emissions at the operating frequency were as high as 60 dB over the airplane equipment emission limits ...

Boeing also performed an airplane test on the ground with the same 16 phones. The airplane was placed in a flight mode and the flight deck instruments, control surfaces, and communication/navigation systems were monitored. No susceptibility was observed.

There is also a battery pack in the mid-section of the plane (page 787.0.7), near the trailing edge of the wings.

who needs a flying trike when you can have a flying 18 wheeler that has far higher fuel efficiency per pound of passenger and/or cargo than that wimpy trike

http://www.boeing.com/boeing/commercial/747family/pf/pf_facts.page

What you stated is generally true, but the 787 is somewhat of a special case. It uses a no-bleed APU system which replaces most of the traditionally bleed-driven systems (e.g. engine start, cabin air and wing anti-icing) with electrical equivalents and probably needs a larger set of batteries and higher current (and/or voltage) wiring.

The problem seems to be that anomalies observed in flight are being reproduced in a lab.

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/aero_10/interfere_textonly.html

Wow! Actual incident information. You need to take a careful look at what that report says though. First, there isn't any date on the report, it refers to 3 incidents in the 1995-1998 time-frame, so I'll speculate it was likely written pre-2000. I'll note this is the very early days of 802.11, and I'm suspecting RF shielding/damping has substantially advanced. While they confirmed in 2 of the cases the suspect devices exceeded Boeing's limit for RF emissions, they were completely unable to recreate the reported interference. I'm left wondering about aircraft maintenance, perhaps some connector somewhere on the planes weren't properly secured, so something on the aircraft that was supposed to be shielded actually wasn't.

As for proof, do you realize how common cellphones are? Even if 1 in 10,000 cellphones is left on during a flight (this is hopelessly optimistic), you've got hundreds of flights every day having an unauthorized cellphone on and radiating RF during the flight. I'm pretty sure cellphones on airplanes are already being tested in airplanes and they seem to be coming out with pretty good safety.

Boeing thinks there is interference:

"Boeing conducted a laboratory and airplane test with 16 cell phones typical of those carried by passengers, to determine the emission characteristics of these intentionally transmitting PEDs. The laboratory results indicated that the phones not only produce emissions at the operating frequency, but also produce other emissions that fall within airplane communication/navigation frequency bands (automatic direction finder, high frequency, very high frequency [VHF] omni range/locator, and VHF communications and instrument landing system [ILS]). Emissions at the operating frequency were as high as 60 dB over the airplane equipment emission limits, but the other emissions were generally within airplane equipment emission limits. One concern about these other emissions from cell phones is that they may interfere with the operation of an airplane communication or navigation system if the levels are high enough."

"Operators of commercial airplanes have reported numerous cases of portable electronic devices affecting airplane systems during flight. These devices, including laptop and palmtop computers, audio players/recorders, electronic games, cell phones, compact-disc players, electronic toys, and laser pointers, have been suspected of causing such anomalous events as autopilot disconnects, erratic flight deck indications, airplanes turning off course, and uncommanded turns. Boeing has recommended that devices suspected of causing these anomalies be turned off during critical stages of flight (takeoff and landing). The company also recommends prohibiting the use of devices that intentionally transmit electromagnetic signals, such as cell phones, during all phases of flight."

The problem seems to be that anomalies observed in flight are being reproduced in a lab.

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/aero_10/interfere_textonly.html

Boeing has an explanation of the rationale and the steps they've taken to examine the effects of electronics on aircraft in their "Aero" magazine. This is pretty old (2000) and would certainly benefit from an update, but they did real live technical investigation instead of just mixing assertions with quasi-technical arguments. A link to the full text:
http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/aero_10/interfere_textonly.html

TLDR Summary:
After receiving very specific, detailed claims/complaints from airlines, Boeing inspected the frequency range output and dB level of electromagnetic emissions from several specific devices. Their biggest concerns in the testing seemed to be the EMI due to frequency harmonics and interactions between devices--the premise and conceptual explanation seems unlikely but isn't completely meritless. No airplane susceptibility was demonstrated. Boeing clearly said that since they tested specific items, the testing was not conclusive for all devices and all interactions.

The excerpt on cell phones in particular deserves to be fully quoted, as it illustrates their thinking:
*Cell phone tests and analysis.*
Boeing conducted a laboratory and airplane test with 16 cell phones typical of those carried by passengers, to determine the emission characteristics of these intentionally transmitting PEDs. The laboratory results indicated that the phones not only produce emissions at the operating frequency, but also produce other emissions that fall within airplane communication/navigation frequency bands (automatic direction finder, high frequency, very high frequency [VHF] omni range/locator, and VHF communications and instrument landing system [ILS]). Emissions at the operating frequency were as high as 60 dB over the airplane equipment emission limits, but the other emissions were generally within airplane equipment emission limits. One concern about these other emissions from cell phones is that they may interfere with the operation of an airplane communication or navigation system if the levels are high enough.

Boeing also performed an airplane test on the ground with the same 16 phones. The airplane was placed in a flight mode and the flight deck instruments, control surfaces, and communication/navigation systems were monitored. No susceptibility was observed.

Telephones installed and certified on the airplane by Boeing or operators are not actually cell phones, but part of an airborne certified satellite system. These phones are electromagnetically compatible with the airplane systems because their emissions are controlled. In contrast, the emissions from passengers’ cell phones are not known or controlled in the same way as permanently installed equipment.

Actually, assuming you leave the solar panels on the ground, batteries may be a viable option:

1. Volta Volare has designed a small electric-hybrid airplane that should be able to go 200 miles on a charge. Of course, it's not an airliner, but...
2. Boeing has designed a concept airliner called the Sugar Volt (video) that can cruise on battery power alone. It could be built as early as 2035.

You're on slashdot, you know technology evolves. The tech on satellites is essentially CMOS cameras and computers to manage sending the data to ground stations. Satellite lifetime: 20 years from design to end of life... "Current" satellite designs are 20 years old. Launch costs are relatively the same. So the choice is to spend a tens (or hundreds) of millions of dollars to put up a platform, and operate for fifteen years or so. So do you put one up with technology that will be forty years old by the end of it's service life? It's going to be the same money whether it is 40 year old tech or twenty year old tech. Do you have a twenty year old CCD camera? Overall, Is that likely good value for money?

Boeing Canard Rotor/Wing demonstrator (see also these images of a fictional craft from 6th day)

--LMGTFY:

http://www.sac.edu/AcademicProgs/ScienceMathHealth/Planetarium/Pages/Benefits-of-the-NASA-Space-Program.aspx

http://www.boeing.com/defense-space/space_exploration/benefits.html

--5 seconds of Googling comes up with plenty of justification for NASA's existence and continued funding. If we would get the f--k out of Afghanistan and give that money to space exploration and development, we might actually have a shot at **surviving as a species** if Terra goes down the drain.

--And yes, I did consider !friending you, but I actually did some research into your previous posts and you seemed decent otherwise. So I replied instead of blindly marking your ID with a red dot. I hope this edifies you.

Sure, here's an article right from Boeing themselves: http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/aero_10/interfere_story.html

Granted the examples they give here are from the 90s, but most of the planes in the air are much older than that, and there is far more technology in the passengers' pockets now than there was then.

I agree with your points and just wanted to add one more thing. There are documented cases where a passenger's consumer electronic device was verified to cause interference with one or more of the plane's systems. The crew located the passenger with the device, had them turn it off and saw that the problem went away. Then, for good measure, had them turn it back on and the problem reappeared. This is proof via the scientific method that it is possible for a device to interfere with an electronic system in a commercial aircraft, and frankly that's enough for me.

Links?

Boeing disputes your claim:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phones_on_aircraft#Electromagnetic_interference

Boeing performed extensive tests as reported in Aero magazine's "Interference from Electronic Devices"[3] in response to reports by flight crews of anomalies that they believed to be caused by electronic devices. The flight crew members claimed they could turn the "suspect" devices on and off and observe effects in the airplane. Boeing, in many cases, was able to purchase the actual device from the passenger and perform extensive testing on it. Boeing was never able to reproduce any of the anomalies. The report concludes:

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/aero_10/interfere_textonly.html

As a result of these and other investigations, Boeing has not been able to find a definite correlation between PEDs and the associated reported airplane anomalies.

If consumer electronics really did cause a problem with aircraft, then the FAA should require much more stringent measures to make sure they are powered off. On about half the flights when I put my phone into my carry on or checked bag, I find that it has powered itself on when I take it out of the bag because the power button is easily depressed accidentally. I bet most flights have a dozen or more phones, tablets, gameboys, etc all powered on and stowed in checked or carryon luggage.

How about cyber-industrial complex instead. Cyber warfare and defense is becoming the new way to milk the Federal government for contracts and money, from the same people who've brought you the defense-industrial complex for the last 70 years, so it shall continue, whether you like it or not.

These would be Lockheed, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, plus a few new players like Palantir. Wonder how Palantir is able to buying up all the free real estate in Silicon Valley?

Chances are they will be gutting your Internet freedoms as a regrettable side effect of making the Internet safe for freedom.

It proved no such thing. FYI, the ALTB Project headed up by Boeing proved that a moving beam firing system (mounted on an aircraft) could hit and disable the ascent stage of a ballistic missile. Then the funding was pulled. It was far from orbital, as was the target. This was *not* a demonstration of viability of *orbital* beam weapons platforms.

I wonder if the electronics on these trucks can be mysteriously fried from a distance with some kind of directed energy beam?. Maybe can be taking out covertly with the ABL/ALTB?

Exactly. The grandparent is complete bullshit and should be modded down.

The US is the world's largest manufacturing nation in terms of economic output. People seem to forget giant companies like Intel, Caterpillar, Boeing, Cisco, ADM etc. not to mention the pharmaceuticals and the farming industry which are world leading. Not only that but the US does it with a mere 8% of its workforce. The economic output of the average US worker is more than 10 times that of his Chinese equivalent because he's more technically skilled and produces far more valuable products in a highly automated setting.

The Boeing main aircraft assembly building in the Seattle area is the largest manufacturing facility in the world.

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/facilities/

It was Boeing who discovered the Y2K problem because they are such a large consumer of aluminum they have to project consumption of aluminum a decade in advance so the aluminum industry can scale their capacity to match their consumption.

I don't know where people get the idea the US isn't competitive in manufacturing. It is a huge force on a global scale in manufacturing, and factors like low energy costs because of the vast natural gas reserves being developed are likely to keep it that way. Anyone writing that the US has no manufacturing capability is full of bullshit.

http://www.shopfloor.org/2011/03/u-s-manufacturing-remains-worlds-largest/18756

http://business.time.com/2011/03/10/can-china-compete-with-american-manufacturing/

Either they're dangerous or they're not. If they're dangerous then the planes need to be fixed to prevent terrorists from using this to cause problems.

You really don't understand statistics, do you? Risk is probabilistic. The target level of safety for aircraft is of the order of less than one accident in 10^7 flight hours, which we're achieving. Turning on a mobile phone does not make the aircraft crash: it increases the risk. If you got lots of terrorists on every flight (which would cost a fortune) you'd probably pull the figure down below 10^7 flight hours to -- oh, who knows, let's say one accident in every 10^6 flight hours. That's an unacceptable level of safety, and you'd see more news of air crashes, but it's still better than it was in the 1970s, so it would hardly induce terror. So the terrorists would have bought all those tickets and failed to achieve their objectives.

The line about terrorists using mobile phones to crash planes is a staple of stand-up comics, but here's a hint: stand up comics are after an immediate laugh, not detailed analysis. They're not a good source of safety policy.

Good idea. It seems to have worked for Blackwater and McDonnell Douglas.

More trains over land, more ship travel over sea, less personal automotive and passenger flight. That's the reality we're heading towards. Get over yourself.

I'd like to point out that passenger ships get about 37 miles per passenger per gallon at about 20 knots, while a Boeing 747 gets nearly 70 miles per passenger per gallon at over 500 knots. So unless you plan on sailing across the ocean, airplanes are still more efficient.

Sources

Ship

Airplane

Sorry, 787 is 50% composite.

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/787family/programfacts.html