Safety Corner

My best ideas come to me in those still, predawn minutes between sleeping and wakefulness when the imagination runs roughshod over reason and even the impossible seems practical. This morning, I invented an Excellent Device that would all but assure aviation safety. I am sure that I shall become a rich man once I have worked out all the details. Follow me through on this.

Computers can do anything that people can program them to do. And programming is simply a matter of issuing instructions that a processor can follow to solve problems. Given comprehensive instructions, a fast enough processor, and adequate memory for storing all the relevant data, an Excellent Device can be crafted to solve almost all of a pilot's problems.

There's no denying we're talking about a sophisticated machine. To be universally useful, the Device must be small enough and light enough to operate in any aircraft — about 3 pounds, say — and must operate independently of the aircraft's electrical system. We'd want it to perform at optimal efficiency for long periods of time — at least a day between recharges, so it must have better batteries than current laptop computers.

To simplify certification and ensure that it can be moved from one aircraft to another, it would have to be portable, and we'd have to develop a really slick interface to mate the Device to the aircraft; the most promising possibilities here are in the relatively new fields of optical recognition and natural-language processing systems, but we'd probably want it to be able to respond to other types of input as well.

To make this possible, as far as programming goes, we'd have to use the most advanced artificial intelligence techniques to develop an expert system fully capable of making highly accurate judgments to aid the pilot in his decision-making. And for multiple-pilot aircraft, we'd want two or more Devices that can process data independently and then agree on the single best solution to a problem.

This Excellent Device will aid the pilot in all his operations. It will automate the process of flight planning, selecting the most efficient routes and altitudes. All of the performance data for any number of different aircraft can be quickly loaded into its memory, as can information regarding airports along the proposed route of flight. A big safety benefit will be the Device's capability of acquiring and interpreting weather data. Imagine — as he walks out to his airplane, the pilot will have at his fingertips weather reports and forecasts, fuel requirements, alternatives available if the flight can not be completed as planned, any traffic delays ATC knows of, runway lengths at the airports to be used, and computed takeoff and landing distances appropriate to the aircraft's performance under the expected values of airport elevation and runway slope, gross weight, and wind and temperature. And this information, particularly the weather data, will be constantly updated and reprocessed in flight.

The Device will provide the pilot with check lists for all phases of flight, from the initial walkaround to after-shutdown procedures. Emergency check fists will always be in its memory, available for instant access should something go wrong. The Device will make sure that no check list is skipped, and it will automatically return to perform items that may have been missed or postponed.

Enroute, the Device will scan for traffic, providing short- to medium- range traffic alert and collision avoidance system (TCAS) services. At the same time, it will monitor engine and other systems instruments, alerting the pilot to any anomalies, replacing or supplementing the built-in engine indicating and crew alerting system (EICAS). It will control the aircraft's heading and altitude (whether or not an autopilot is installed), perform navigation computations, and set and double-check communications and navigation frequencies, OBS and ADF settings, and transponder codes. The Device will provide the equivalent of Mode S data link capabilities, communicating the pilot intentions to ATC and ATC's requests and clearances to the pilot in a clear and easily understood form. In the latter instance, it will error-check ATC's advisories to make sure they were properly received, interpreted, and executed. It will compute vertical navigation, reminding the pilot to begin his descent early enough to avoid high-speed, low-power descents that can damage the engine while still complying with any crossing restrictions issued by ATC. Throughout the flight, it will be constantly updating fuel consumption information to ensure that the aircraft will arrive at its destination with the predetermined safety margin of fuel. If at any point in the flight it appears that this cannot be done, the Device will point the airplane toward a preselected alternate.

In the approach phase, the Device will continue to monitor traffic conflicts, keeping an "out" always available to the pilot. It will carefully watch over descent rates and minimum altitudes for the approach and will know the locations of the initial and final approach fixes, the missed approach point, and the missed approach procedure. It will automatically start timing the approach at the FAF, taking wind speed and direction into account in determining the groundspeed to provide the appropriate FAF to MAP time.

This Device will help the aircraft owner save money because it will keep detailed records of powerplant operations and any unusual engine indications. While it will not be able to prevent accidents stemming from unusual causes such as structural failure, its database, containing airworthiness directives, service difficulty reports, and service recommendations — and its capability to determine that all required maintenance has been performed properly — would allow the careful pilot to make sure his airplane is as ready for flight as possible.

It also can't guarantee to keep the pilot out of legal problems stemming from an inadvertent violation of the Federal Aviation Regulations, but its FAR database would put all the required information at the pilot's fingertips instantly.

The Device can't prevent get-home-itis from rearing up, but it will strongly recommend that the pilot fly another day. In defense of its argument, it will keep tabs on the pilot's health, his level of stress and fatigue, and his use of prescription drugs, tobacco, and alcohol. It will track his diet and the amount of sleep and exercise he's getting.

And this is just the beginning. There's really almost nothing that this Excellent Device can't do to make flying as safe as it can ever be. Only two scenarios can be envisioned in which it would not perform its designed function. The first is when the pilot does not use it. The second is when the pilot is sharing airspace with other pilots who don't use it. And there's really no solution to those problems.

An estimate of the computing power necessary to do all of the above makes it clear that we'll have to develop a parallel processing architecture much more advanced than anything currently available in computers — the equivalent of about 100 billion tiny processors linked by the equivalent of 100 trillion interconnections. But surely this is well within the reach of the most technologically advanced nation in the world. Indeed, it should be child's play, given our competitive nature and the availability of a large number of defense industry computer scientists idled by the recent, unlamented demise of the cold war.

Still, it's bound to be expensive. Given the product liability situation these days, it might never see the light of day.

I guess it's fortunate that we're each born with our own Excellent Device to start with. Now, if I can only dream up a way to make sure that every pilot will use his, I'll be a rich man for sure.