Digital comms is available in the US:
* https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/DataComm
The issue is that the final approach and landing (and taxiing?) environments are probably too dynamic for that: in this particular situation one of the vehicles was responding to an emergency (fire).
In addition to huge planes, there is baggage transportation, passenger buses (to mid-field terminals), fuel pumpers, emergency vehicles, snow plows, deicers, and general maintenance vehicles (clear debris off runways).
Literally the crash here was caused by a fire truck entering the runway.
No one here or anywhere is saying automation would solve or be able to handle everything that human operators handle, that's an argument you invented that no one is making.
People are saying automation could handle a significant portion of the routine things allowing humans to handle the more complex/finicky issues.
Even if automation could handle 10% of the most common situations it would be a huge boon. In reality its probably closer to 50%.
If the reason you have the human there is to handle the unusual cases, you run the real risk that they just aren't paying attention at critical moments when they need to pay attention.
It's pretty similar to the problem with L3 autonomous driving.
Probably the sweet spot is automation which makes clear the current set of instructions on the airport which also red flags when a dangerous scenario is created. I believe that already exists, but it's software that was last written in 1995 or so.
Regardless, before any sort of new automation could be deployed, we need slack for the ATC to be able to adopt a new system. That's the biggest pressing problem. We could create the perfect software for ATC, but if the current air traffic controllers are all working overtime and doing a job designed for 3 people rather than one, they simply won't have the time to explore and understand that new system. It'll get in the way rather than solve a problem. More money is part of the solution here, but we also need a revamped ATC training program which can help to fill the current hole.
Very possibly. It will be interesting what comes from the investigation.
> No one here or anywhere is saying automation would solve or be able to handle everything that human operators handle, that's an argument you invented that no one is making.
I’m asking if it would have solved even the current situation. The truck presumably saw the red light, and was asking to cross. Would traffic control have said no if more had been automated and if so, what automation would fix this? Unless we are supposing the truck would be autonomously driven and refuse to proceed when planes are landing, in which case, maybe, though that’s not really ATC automation anymore.
Software routinely solves database coordination problems with millions of users per second.
Even if most of the work is routine, you definitely still want a human in the loop.
This isn't a Kubernetes cluster where you can add VMs in 30 seconds.
....if they go around kilometer of the runway the fire will turn into bigger fire
I imagine the training will consist of something like changing the comms protocol to say “runway lights are on, control. Truck 1 confirming cross runway 4D?” prior to crossing. Double check so to speak.
A naive view that confuses the map with the territory.
While in a database state you write a row and reality updates atomically....for aircraft they exist in a physical world where your model lives with lag, noise, and lossy sensors, and that world keeps moving whether your software is watching or not. Failed database transactions roll back, a landing clearance issued against stale state does not. The hard problem in ATC is not coordination logic but physical objects with momentum, human agency, and failure modes that do not respect your consistency model.
Or to stick with the language of the analogy, every fruit tree has some fruit that is lower than the others. That doesn't mean all "low-hanging fruit" is within arm's reach of the ground, some fruit just doesn't require as big of a ladder as other fruit.
This comment isn't a judgment of this specific case. I don't know enough about ATC to have any confidence in my opinion on the viability of replacing humans with software.
That was my first comment in this thread, so there was no established goal to change. My sole goal was to clarify the meaning of an idiom that the comment I was replying to was misstating.
I even included a disclaimer that "This comment isn't a judgment of this specific case", so I don't know how you could have received it as such.
Go write it then.
It's stupid, wasteful, and ultimately dangerous to make a human do a machine's job.
It takes all of two minutes of Wikipedia reading for me to understand why this isn’t simple; why it's actually extremely not simple! If you ignore the incumbency, the regulations, the training requirements, the retrofitting, the verification, the international coordination, and the existing unfathomably reliable systems built out of past tragedies, then sure, it’s "simple". But then, if you're ignoring those things, you’re not really solving the problem, are you?
Those are excuses and encumbrances, not reasons. If they are so important, it leads to a question: what existing automated systems can we improve by adding similar constraints?
If these are just "excuses" and not "reasons," then explain how you have determined them as such.
I would like to say, "Because knowledgeable people have explained the difference to me." But again, this has come up before, and no explanations are ever provided. Only vague, reactionary hand-waving, assuring me that humans -- presumably not the same ones who just directed a fire truck and an aircraft onto the same active runway, but humans nevertheless -- are vital for safety in ATC, because for reasons such as and therefore.
There you are doing it in order to avoid engaging with the substance of what people are saying.
There is no substance in the replies. There never is. Only unanchored FUD.
"Because it's always been done that way, and that's what the regulations say," will not be accepted, at least not by me.
(Really, my question is more like why humans will still be needed in the loop in 2036. If we started automating ATC today, that's probably how long it would take to cut over to the new system.)
If these are just "excuses" and not "reasons," then explain how you have determined them as such.
This is just not how complex systems work. N of 1 events happen regularly, which is exactly what makes them challenging.
You simply asserting every scenario has been seen before does not actually make it so.
Confusion is indeed a common side effect of a job done halfway.
Replying: I'm really confused at the point you're trying to make - you declared yourself not an expert in this field, while loudly declaring it's so easy to automate.
Because we've already done harder things. 1000 takeoffs and landings per day equals a trillion machine cycles between events... on the phone in your pocket. It is an extraordinary claim, requiring extraordinary proof, to say that this task isn't suitable for automation.
Why don't you do it then? What am I missing?
I'm not qualified to do it, I didn't say I was, and in any event, I don't work for free. I'm asking for concrete reasons why it's not feasible. Spoiler: there are no reasons, only excuses.
The concrete reason your ideas won’t work is you don’t have any.
It's not my job to explain how to do it, it's your job to explain why it can't or shouldn't be done. The extraordinary claim is yours, not mine.
Remember how we installed traffic lights all over the roads and now car crashes never happen any more at intersections? Truly automation solves all problems.
Hard to respond to an argument of this quality, at least without getting flagged or worse.
I know this was rhetorical but the obvious answer is a complete lack of any actual ideas. “Just automate it” is a common refrain from people who don’t know how to fix the actual issues with any domain.
Remember how we installed traffic lights all over the roads and now car crashes never happen any more at intersections? Truly automation solves all problems.
It sounds like you're not asking anything at all
Just to play it out a bit, are you imagining that a pilot would be reporting a mechanical failure upon descent into busy airspace to some type of like AI voice agent, who will then orchestrate other aircraft out of the way (and not into each other) while also coaching the crippled aircraft out of the sky?
Are you imagining some vast simplification that obviates the need for such capability? Because that doesn't seem simple at all to me.
> I'm asking for concrete reasons why it's not feasible.
The concrete reason your ideas won’t work is you don’t have any.
Why don’t you describe the hypothetical automation you believe would solve the problems then?
My hunch is that either your ideas are already implemented (like GP post who said they need to add red lights at the runway instances, except yeah, they do have that), or they are just bad.
> indignant sputtering and patronizing hand-waving.
Preemptively insulting everyone who might respond to you certainly looks like you’re asking for a real conversation. :|
Your accusation of “patronizing hand-waving” is especially off base considering you literally proposed nothing except “automating”. Hand waving indeed.
Just curious: how many people in this thread know what SAGE was? A $5 Arduino has more computing power than the whole SAGE network. This isn't 1958, so we don't need the 'Semi' part of 'Semi-Automatic Ground Environment' anymore.