Your take on UAV's impact

[CommodoreMid]

That plan is what they were pushing at the symposium this year and I had heard from my front office a year ago, just repeating it here. Basically they put out when it comes to DH slate time all VP types who got picked up for DH can be slated for either Triton or P-8. You wouldn't be able to opt out of one or the other and only P-8 DHs could become P-8 skippers and Triton DHs could only become Triton skippers. You are right that a lot could change by the time VUP-19 is fully operational, but as of now that's the plan according to Them.

 

[ArkhamAsylum]

Gentlemens -
I am one of the Corps' most recent wingers-turned-unmanned-aviators, so am probably one of the most qualified to speak on the subject on the Green-side of the house.
1. "Should flying robots ever transport humans?" Good question. If the human passengers want to travel aboard an aircraft that has a 50% higher safety rating (uncited statistic) than its manned counterparts, then the answer is a resounding "Yes."
2. "Can unmanned aircraft provide the same responsiveness as its manned counterparts?" Good question. While a manned platform is on strip-alert (Alert-30, for example), an unmanned aircraft has already been airborne for about 4 hours, and has about 30 hours remaining on-station.

Just some food for thought, to re-invigorate a 6-month old discussion thread.

 

[whitesoxnation]

Gentlemens -
I am one of the Corps' most recent wingers-turned-unmanned-aviators, so am probably one of the most qualified to speak on the subject on the Green-side of the house.
1. "Should flying robots ever transport humans?" Good question. If the human passengers want to travel aboard an aircraft that has a 50% higher safety rating (uncited statistic) than its manned counterparts, then the answer is a resounding "Yes."
2. "Can unmanned aircraft provide the same responsiveness as its manned counterparts?" Good question. While a manned platform is on strip-alert (Alert-30, for example), an unmanned aircraft has already been airborne for about 4 hours, and has about 30 hours remaining on-station.

Just some food for thought, to re-invigorate a 6-month old discussion thread.

What flying robot has a 50% higher safety rating? Are they flying the same missions as manned?

 

[Machine]

Responsiveness and safety...Did you know the RQ-4 rejects waveoff commands below a certain altitude (I think it's around 200' AGL)? One day there were some people on the runway (in an undisclosed location somewhere in SW Asia, of course) who got to see some UAV safety up close...that is, the RQ-4 overflew them within a couple feet after it rejected a waveoff command.

Mishap rates and crashes are significantly higher for UAVs vs. manned aircraft (we're talking multiples higher). They have a LONG way to go before anyone considers them for passenger transport.

 

[Treetop Flyer]

Gentlemens -
I am one of the Corps' most recent wingers-turned-unmanned-aviators, so am probably one of the most qualified to speak on the subject on the Green-side of the house.
1. "Should flying robots ever transport humans?" Good question. If the human passengers want to travel aboard an aircraft that has a 50% higher safety rating (uncited statistic) than its manned counterparts, then the answer is a resounding "Yes."
2. "Can unmanned aircraft provide the same responsiveness as its manned counterparts?" Good question. While a manned platform is on strip-alert (Alert-30, for example), an unmanned aircraft has already been airborne for about 4 hours, and has about 30 hours remaining on-station.

Just some food for thought, to re-invigorate a 6-month old discussion thread.

I'd be interested to see that statistic you just made up. Last I checked they were still crashing UAV's like it was going out of style.

 

[Hotdogs]

2. "Can unmanned aircraft provide the same responsiveness as its manned counterparts?" Good question. While a manned platform is on strip-alert (Alert-30, for example), an unmanned aircraft has already been airborne for about 4 hours, and has about 30 hours remaining on-station.

30 hours?

50% higher safety rating?

Start busting out your sources.

 

[Swanee]

30 hours is a real number, the Reaper can do some crazy long missions when it doesn't have anything hanging on the wings.
But 50% safer is all dependent on what we're talking about. We're crashing RQ-7Bs and MQ-21s more than we should be. There are reasons for it though.

 

[Uncle Fester]

I've never seen UAS safety statistics broken out by class. The big-boy class 4/5 drones vs the small fry. Seems like Scan Eagles and smaller get tossed like paper airplanes sometimes.

My impression is that aviation safety is startlingly casual when it comes to UAS. I personally had a lot of conversations where phrases to the effect of "well, if it crashes, who cares?" were tossed about. Never mind that, one, class 4/5s aren't cheap even if there isn't a meatbag in the plane, and two, it's still a big airplane flying through the same airspace as manned aircraft. The safety culture on the robot side of the house needs adjusting. There's a lot of reasons why comparing manned vs UAS mishap rates isn't an apples-to-apples yet, and that's one of the big ones.

 

[Swanee]

I've never seen UAS safety statistics broken out by class. The big-boy class 4/5 drones vs the small fry. Seems like Scan Eagles and smaller get tossed like paper airplanes sometimes.

My impression is that aviation safety is startlingly casual when it comes to UAS. I personally had a lot of conversations where phrases to the effect of "well, if it crashes, who cares?" were tossed about. Never mind that, one, class 4/5s aren't cheap even if there isn't a meatbag in the plane, and two, it's still a big airplane flying through the same airspace as manned aircraft. The safety culture on the robot side of the house needs adjusting. There's a lot of reasons why comparing manned vs UAS mishap rates isn't an apples-to-apples yet, and that's one of the big ones.

This attitude is changing- those of us whom wear pilot/NFO wings and have made the jump to the UAV world are working hard to change this. Some of the stuff I learned as I joined the DSS shop here was downright scary.

Class 4 and 5 communities are changing quicker and have pretty much adopted the standard aviation safety model. Class 3 is on the way, as that is the only way we can truly integrate safely onboard the ship and with the ops that we want to conduct ashore. Class 2 and below are pretty startling- the paper airplane comment is accurate.

 

[Hopeful Hoya]

Just out of curiosity, what kinds of UAS are NAs/NFOs in the Navy currently involved in? Are you guys mostly doing development stuff for like the X-47 and the MQ-4 or is this an operational thing that you can track for out of Primary/Intermediate?

 

[Swanee]

Just out of curiosity, what kinds of UAS are NAs/NFOs in the Navy currently involved in? Are you guys mostly doing development stuff for like the X-47 and the MQ-4 or is this an operational thing that you can track for out of Primary/Intermediate?

I'm a Marine- on our side there is a fleet transition process for winged guys and there is a pipeline selection coming out of TBS. Currently there is not an option for selecting UAVs in flight school.

 

[Uncle Fester]

Just out of curiosity, what kinds of UAS are NAs/NFOs in the Navy currently involved in? Are you guys mostly doing development stuff for like the X-47 and the MQ-4 or is this an operational thing that you can track for out of Primary/Intermediate?

Reservists are doing a lot of the current operational Navy UAS. Eventually a significant chunk of VP will be VUP, but I'll let them speak to how far along that is. I don't think they'll be taking Cat 1s directly into UAS in the near-term.

 

[Gatordev]

I've never seen UAS safety statistics broken out by class. The big-boy class 4/5 drones vs the small fry. Seems like Scan Eagles and smaller get tossed like paper airplanes sometimes.

My impression is that aviation safety is startlingly casual when it comes to UAS. I personally had a lot of conversations where phrases to the effect of "well, if it crashes, who cares?" were tossed about. Never mind that, one, class 4/5s aren't cheap even if there isn't a meatbag in the plane, and two, it's still a big airplane flying through the same airspace as manned aircraft. The safety culture on the robot side of the house needs adjusting. There's a lot of reasons why comparing manned vs UAS mishap rates isn't an apples-to-apples yet, and that's one of the big ones.

Chatting with the OIC of the det that followed yours, it seemed part of the "discretionary" mindset comes from "the customer" and not NAVAIR (or whomever). It seems like the expected "mission first, people second, hardware last" that comes from those customers pervades into the UAS world. In some ways, you have to admire it, but obviously that's not a completely realistic mindset in today's budgetary situation.

 

[busdriver]

It seems to me that there needs to be a breakout in the safety world for UAVs; those lost due to intentional actions versus those lost to unintentional actions. It sounds like that isn't the case right now, to be fair I don't know how it works in the Air Force and I'm a safety officer!

There's a unique value in being able to sacrifice the aircraft due to operational necessity, while that still needs a bit of sanity check wrt cost vs reward, it shouldn't be lumped into losing an aircraft due to a screw-up and vice versa.

 

[Uncle Fester]

Well, there's being willing to accept risks you wouldn't with a manned aircraft - which is part of why you have UAS to begin with - and then there's taking stupid chances with an expensive piece of hardware just because no one will get killed. Flying into a CB or trolling for SAMs at 2k' AGL under a cloud deck comes to mind. And I'm amazed how often people forget that there may not be anyone in the drone, but it can still crash into meat-filled things.