This way of "relating" between crew members screams of danger to safety. Should this not be investigated as a safety incident by FAA and NTSB?

(Written on 10/07/2022)(Permalink)

In today's world, the technically competent workforce is directed and micromanaged by business majors who may know money but are not competent at engineering. Engineers are grounded in physical reality so they get hog-tied because their bosses want to invent their own truth. This is just like doctors who now are now subordinate to and micromanaged by bosses who don't know medicine. Administrators used to be subordinate to the experts in the field and were minimized as a necessary evil back in the days of professional pride in quality, exemplified by Boeing.

(Written on 10/07/2022)(Permalink)

A major flaw in ADSB is its ancient technology. A $50 cell phone is perhaps a million times more efficient at conveying information than ADSB which uses pulse amplitude modulation inherited from the earliest Identification Friend or Foe schemes. Then, the FAA demanded that the signals be receivable from spacecraft hence the hundreds of watts of power that is required. (There are a dozen more system flaws that aren't crucial to this issue.) Aricraft that were not considered sufficiently in ADSB design are exempt from squitter outside of Class C and B airspace and up to FL100 above them. ADSB is not suitable for their designs, modes of flight, and budgets. It seems that many of the commentators here, and powered aircraft pilots appear unaware of the numerous aircraft they share the less controlled airspace with. There are manned balloons and unmanned going to 100,000 feet; parafoils up to FL180 and powered parafoils, hang gliders up to FL180, and trikes; ultralight airplanes up to Class

(Written on 08/26/2022)(Permalink)

There are at least three possible truths to what is wrong. A coin that flipps to heads 10 times in a row may still be a perfectly fair coin and it is just luck. There may be a systematic flaw in maintenance. Or, it's a lemon, like many cars manufactured on a Friday.

(Written on 08/26/2022)(Permalink)

Most gliders and balloons are certified without an electrical system. To add one, the supplemental certification would cost more than the whole aircraft. Even the cost of the new ADSB equipment would be a major fraction of the total cost. Some glider and balloon pilots squitter using avionics that are "personal accessories", not certified to any standard, similarly to the use of phones and tablets for navigation, bypassing the certification, but personal equipment can't be mandated. @linbb, Isn't it the transport operators and pilots that act as if they "own the air"? In a midair collision, the faster aircraft flies into the slower one. Shouldn't the faster aircraft be more burdened with technology for avoidance? The additional cost of the technology is also more equitable given that the faster aircraft cost a lot more and have a greater cash flow supporting them than slower aircraft. Fortunately, new radar and optical technologies will soon augment the human eye, far outperforming i

(Written on 08/26/2022)(Permalink)

The shutdown created major problems because of its partial nature. The politicians did not shut down the monetary system at all, so businesses and individual owed money while being blocked from making money. If we had truly shut everything down, there would be no pandemic, and the loss of mankind producing nothing for a few weeks, a loss of $billions, would be small compared to the cost of Covid19, an ongoing cost.

(Written on 08/26/2022)(Permalink)

I hope no one dies because of 5G. Equipment in planes meets technical requirements that were codified in a different radio environment from the one with C band 5G. It is not the altimeter manufacturers, nor the aircraft operators that changed the environment. It seems entirely unjust for the air travel sector to be burdened with fixing the problem. If the telecoms want to make the radio environment dirty and hostile, they should pay for making other C band user's equipment robust to their interference - they are culpable for instigating the problem.

(Written on 08/19/2022)(Permalink)

So, why don't they? (Rhetorical question.)

(Written on 04/29/2022)(Permalink)

I hope the FCC will also scrutinize out of band emissions of the 5G radios, both the base stations/towers, and the consumer client devices - That's billions of radios that can wreak havoc and disable or confuse avionics.

(Written on 04/29/2022)(Permalink)

Part of the problem is that the FAA and ICAO operate with a "live in the past" mindset when it comes to electronic technology. Businesses like 5G telecoms use the latest. Even hollywood predicted most of today's radio gadgets, but aviation refused to look ahead. Manufacturers don't warrant nor expect their gear to be used as long as actually is and in the past there was little C band interference to worry about.I suppose the FCC was acting in concordance with FAA's system outlooks and culture. Examples: COM is 1930s voice technology, mode C, S, and ADSB haven't advanced the radio signalling past 1950s IFF technology. To be fair, GPS/WAAS is modern as is UAT.

(Written on 04/29/2022)(Permalink)