Automation emboldens policy makers to reduce human count because of the perceived increase in safety. This results in less eyes and brains monitoring for situations of automation failure or abnormalities. The corner stone of aviation safety over the last several decades has been having multiple, highly trained and experienced operators on station monitoring aviation systems to catch those moments when something goes wrong. Additionally, a culture where those operators are encouraged to speak up and be heard when something goes wrong without fear of being reprimanded is essential.
replyAutomation is fantastic. We use it extensively in aviation. However, the long tail of 9s in reliable requires constant vigilance and oversight because anything that can go wrong will.
Who's entering the signal that the runway is locked? What if they screw up?
replyThere are so many failure modes with vehicles and planes using the same tarmac that I fail to see how anything would be worth developing here that doesn't eliminate that requirement altogether.
Currently it’s automated at this airport: https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/rwsl
replyPresumably this is lack of familiarity with this on the part of firefighters.
Ah, okay. I suppose it'll be part of the investigation but I wonder if the RELs were indiciating an unsafe runway which prompted the firetruck to ask or if they always ask for permission. Either way, I think my assesment is still correct: there are a lot of edge cases that neither lights nor humans are going to stop. O'Hare apparently has tunnels/underpasses for ground vehicles to use which seems basically foolproof for avoiding collisions like this.
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