RAF Pilots Blinded At 1000 Mph By Helmet Technical Glitch

codeusirae writes "RAF pilots were left 'blinded' by a barrage of images while flying at speeds of over 1,000 mph when a number of technical glitches hit their high-tech helmets. The visors were supposed to provide the fighter pilots with complete vision and awareness, but problems with the display produced a blurring known as 'green-glow,' meaning they were unable to see clearly.The green glow occurred when a mass of information was displayed on the helmet-mounted display systems, including radar pictures and images from cameras mounted around the aircraft."

Comments

Relying exclusively on electronic technology

[ls671]

Relying exclusively on electronic technology introduce a single point of point of failure. Fly by wires, car ecu etc.

Not being able to fall back to some kind of manual mechanical control introduces all kinds of vulnerabilities. Whether it is a glitch in the software, solar flares, aliens or something else ;-)

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/10/29/208205/toyotas-killer-firmware

http://www.ecutesting.com/toyota.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/ufo/8026971/Aliens-have-deactivated-British-and-US-nuclear-missiles-say-US-military-pilots.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fly-by-wire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engine_control_unit

Re:Relying exclusively on electronic technology

[jklovanc]

You really need to learn more about modern aircraft. When an aircraft is designed there is a trade off between stability and maneuverability. The more stable something is the less maneuverable it is. Today's aircraft are very unstable and very manuverable. Electronocs allow that becouse they can make the thousands of control inputs per second to keep the aircraft stable. Most modern fighters would fly apart of if the electronics failed even if there were mechanical backups.

By the way, the backup for the visor failing is lift the visor and use the cockpit readouts.