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New Satellite Network Will Make It Impossible For a Commercial Airplane To Vanish (cbsnews.com)
pgmrdlm quotes a report from CBS News: For the first time, a new network of satellites will soon be able to track all commercial airplanes in real time, anywhere on the planet. Currently, planes are largely tracked by radar on the ground, which doesn't work over much of the world's oceans. The final 10 satellites were launched Friday to wrap up the $3 billion effort to replace 66 aging communication satellites, reports CBS News' Kris Van Cleave, who got an early look at the new technology.
On any given day, 43,000 planes are in the sky in America alone. When these planes take off, they are tracked by radar and are equipped with a GPS transponder. All commercial flights operating in the U.S. and Europe have to have them by 2020. It's that transponder that talks to these new satellites, making it possible to know exactly where more than 10,000 flights currently flying are.
On any given day, 43,000 planes are in the sky in America alone. When these planes take off, they are tracked by radar and are equipped with a GPS transponder. All commercial flights operating in the U.S. and Europe have to have them by 2020. It's that transponder that talks to these new satellites, making it possible to know exactly where more than 10,000 flights currently flying are.
I think they also need to make it impossible to turn off GPS. IIRC, that's what the pilot did on flight MH370.
It's that transponder that talks to these new satellites, making it possible to know exactly where more than 10,000 flights currently flying are.
So, perhaps in the event of transponder malfunction?
The fallacy of absolutes is why we can now only rate products as idiot-resistant, since idiot-proof only lasts until we encounter a more consummate idiot.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
For one thing, the GPS satellites include error correction code, and can even be programmed to exclude certain events. They are military satellites, and we don't tell you about certain things, because it's none of your business.
But, other than flights or areas we don't want you to know about, and if they actually have functional GPS transponders, yes, you can now follow them.
If we want you to.
Fun experiment: watch how your GPS gets more inaccurate and stops working in certain areas when there are certain international incidents. You'll even see your location suddenly jump way far away.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I'm pretty sure YouTube is going to dub this The Malaysia Airlines Challenge before taking the video down. ;)
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
But these new Iridium satellites are made so they don't have that very focused reflection that makes a brief light of about 5-10 seconds that is as an airplane light.
https://www.iridium.com/flarew...
While I agree with you, I'm wondering whether there is a fear than an "anti-crash" system might interfere - accidentally - with the drastic flight-commands an airline pilot may give the plane (to save some passengers) just before an unwanted collision with hard ground occurs. Remember this Airbus 320 ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?... ) which supposedly crashed into trees, killing everyone on board, because the autopilot of the time "fought the pilot" over who should control the plane at low altitude? I agree that there should be a mechanism that prevents a mad pilot from crashing a plane deliberately, but the mechanism needs to be such that it doesn't "misinterpret" the actions a non-mad pilot undertakes to bring down an airliner in a controlled manner - into an empty field perhaps. Just changing the angle of the nose a bit during an emergency landing could kill everyone on an airliner.
Why did the chicken cross the road? Because Elon Musk put an AI chip in its head.
Of course they can still vanish. Turn off the ADS-B transmitter on the aircraft and poof they're gone from the ADS-B receiver on the (Iridium) satellite.
As another poster mentioned - it's pretty hard to prevent this sort of thing while allowing the pilot to do what (s)he needs to do in an emergency situation. These aircraft are already quite automated, but to completely wrest control of the airplane from the pilot, especially at low altitude... That's not good. And it would be difficult for the computer to definitively say: Ok, the pilot is in control, or the pilot is suicidal. And even if the pilot is suicidal, what does the aircraft do then exactly?
The only way this works is if there is remote control (as in, drone tech) - and that has to be absolute perfection.
The others are non-commercial flights, not requiring transponders.
CCTV-like live video feeds from the cockpit and cabin going up to a satellite uplink at all times
You do realize that trans-oceanic planes regularly go places where there is no line-of-sight communications to civilization on the ground? Bandwidth over satellite isn't cheap, especially before this new generation of Iridium. The original Iridium didn't even have a digital mode; access devices had to have their own modem circuitry.
They're certainly not going to spend that much just because one (1) pilot (probably) went psycho and deliberately evaded tracking. There have been other cases of pilots going psycho and crashing the plane, but only one was able to hide the plane too. And if you saw some shit going down, what would you do about it anyhow?
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
That restricting the pilot will lead to disaster, or that not restricting the pilot will let them cause a disaster?
I would say that being able to track there position is most unlikely to either cause a disaster or prevent one. But it would make it much cheaper to find the bits left over from a disaster.
I was involved in design of FDR/CVR systems a while ago, and I cannot recall any subsystem that could NOT be shut down. Our recorders (Sundstrand Data Control units) were to check for "zero data" and based upon other sensors assert a flag indicating whether the input died OR the pilot shut it off. This configuration was altered for each airframe, as many systems were cross-linked and you could usually figure out if a system was shut off or you had a malfunction (which would bring down other systems). I can't recall of any system that was exempted - because the FAA wanted pilots to be able to shut down ANY electrical device in case of shorts or fire.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Out of 136 people on board, only 3 died, all of smoke inhalation due to not being able to escape the aircraft.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The aircraft was intentionally flying at a very low altitude as it was part of an airshow, demonstrating fly-by-wire. It was the fist public demonstration of fbw, which obviously didn't go well.
Nope. Still required for any flight in certain types of controlled airspace. Commercial/Private
GPS is a receiver (unless you're the satellite). It's probably ADS-B they're talking about. This takes the GPS position as input, and transmits position information which can appear on air traffic control screens superimposed with radar.
It's possible to lie about your GPS position. This is why air traffic controllers have not stopped using radar (they know something is there whether it's squawking the right information from its ADS-B transponder or not).
It is also possible to screw up your local air traffic controller with spoofed ADS-B transmissions. Cryptographic signature is not part of the system yet.
Bruce Perens.
It's considered an act of war for a military aircraft to stop squawking its ADS-B information in another nation's airspace, without order of that nation.
Bruce Perens.
The older Iridium satellites had 3 large, flat antennae on the bottom. These would reflect sunlight down, and if viewed at the right time and place after dark or before dawn, would go from invisible to the brightest thing in the sky for a few seconds. Since the satellites were in predictable orbits and orientation, it was possible to forecast exactly when these flares would occur. I enjoyed viewing them, and surprising people by pointing them out ahead of time. I'll miss them, since the new satellites are a completely different design.
You are a moron too, Mr. Licensed Pilot. Don't try to fake us out that you know anything more about the radios on your airplane than how to operate them. GPS is a receive-only system. There are no "GPS transponders". They are some other kind of transponder.
Bruce Perens.
Congratulations on making a fool of yourself, then, Randy.
Bruce Perens.
CCTV-like live video feeds from the cockpit and cabin going up to a satellite uplink at all times
You do realize that trans-oceanic planes regularly go places where there is no line-of-sight communications to civilization on the ground?
You do realize that satellites are not on the ground?
Bandwidth over satellite isn't cheap, especially before this new generation of Iridium.
Some systems are cheaper than others.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"Impossible" is a pretty big word.
How about we start with "nearly impossible" and see how that goes?
-Styopa
Would airline passengers not pay an extra 10 bucks each to travel in a "always connected" airplane that doesn't "vanish" in some far-flung ocean somewhere?
As opposed to spending that ten dollars on seat selection/overhead storage/etc? I doubt it.
A much better idea would be to install 3 or 4 additional Black Boxes with radio beacons which would be programmed to eject themselves if the plane went into a fast non-recoverable dive. They could be filled with expanding styrofoam or similar, guaranteed to float if they land in water, and tough enough to withstand impact on land. By recovering the ones that ejected first, and tracing the line, the final position of the aircraft would be known,.
They're certainly not going to spend that much just because one (1) pilot (probably) went psycho and deliberately evaded tracking. There have been other cases of pilots going psycho and crashing the plane, but only one was able to hide the plane too. And if you saw some shit going down, what would you do about it anyhow?
Indeed. Insurers (and that is what it comes down to) can live very well with the occasional unexplained loss. It is just the general public that has trouble dealing with reality.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Who wrote the code the computer runs to make decisions? A human! Why do you trust human written code to recover in an emergency more than a human pilot trained to respond to emergency situations?
"This mission is too important to allow you to jeopardize it." -- HAL
GPS is a receiving system only. Transmitting is done with something else and that can contain your location you received through GPS.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
43000 planes in the air in the US and it can track 10000? Even uf that is for the US, that means onky 25% is tracked.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Why is this not a thing already?
If you gave me a choice between a printer and a giraffe with explosive diarrhoea, i'll get my ladder and my raincoat
Very impressed.
For some people like amateur and professional astronomers these flares have been a big nuisance. They can destroy sensitive photodetectors for instance.
New Satellite Network Will Make It Impossible For a Commercial Airplane To Vanish
"The plane is gone? Inconceivable!"
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
Most amateur astronomers like to observe them. Planes are much brighter and far more likely to ruin your image. I have lots of frames ruined by planes, as well as random satellites and meteors. Iridium flares are very predicable and can be avoided.
Someone would have to pay for it, and satellite bandwidth for tens of thousands of aircraft over the entire planetary surface is expensive. You could provide (not very fast) internet for about 50 people from the bandwidth of your proposed system.
Insurers can not only live with the occasional unexplained loss. They depend on them.
Imagine if there where none. That would mean they would not pay out any insurance, but more importantly, not receive any insurance either.
They just need to do "(Payout * 1.x)" and that is what they will receive. The .x is their profit. If there is no payout, there will nothing to receive (unless they make up fraudulents contracts and/or the airlines are idiots)
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Even a team of humans may not be prepared when something occurs that is unexpected or a system fails in an unexpected way.
Not everything can be scripted.
Indeed. They would probably need to create fictional losses if there were no real ones. The higher the risk-perception and the lower the actual risk, the better for their business.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.