Can an aircraft be made too easy to fly?

[Boac]

Obviously not too good a 'trip' for him.................

[TheGreenGoblin]

Obviously not too good a 'trip' for him.................

Oh well at least he didn't go up in smoke like Cheech and Chong...

[Boac]

Hmm.............

[barkingmad]

"Was there any wind when the guy went into the water? If there wasn't then glassy water rears its ugly head. On glassy water there is no depth perception, so it's easy to fly the airplane into the water with predictable results".
This was alleged to be a contributory factor in the accident to Jet Provost T3 XN598 in Gouthwaite Reservoir, in 't Yorkshire Dales, doing the early morning "weather ship" sortie on 01/06/1978.
Lucky he was a solo QFI and the only casualty, there were allegedly other contributing factors into which I will not delve, out of respect for the dead.

[Boac]

Not sure that a 45 degree dive into the water can be blamed on 'glassy water', BM! Pilots have been known to use altimeters.

[G-CPTN]

He was obviously 'having fun'.

[Boac]

Yes, until the last few seconds?

[barkingmad]

I believe it was a 45 degree AoB turn which did for the JP QFI, not a 45 degree dive?

The wing struck the water on Gouthwaite Reservoir, Patley Bridge, Yorkshire during a turn. The aircraft cartwheeled and broke up killing the pilot.
From ukserials.com brief report. And I started at Linton 1979 and it was much talked about then.
I appreciate the thread was regarding the US acident, it was the water glass calm which triggered my post.
Back to afternoon nap...

[Boac]

I know about that crash. We were talking about https://www.flyingmag.com/story/news/nt ... dium=email

[TheGreenGoblin]

A retrospective on this accident...

[Pontius Navigator]

Make them even easier. Look at modern cars, lane keeping, parking assist, proximity warning, adaptive cruise control, automatic lighting and so on.

These innovations could all be incorporated into an aircraft. Imagine arriving at destination, your lane assist aka terrain avoidance gets you safely to the gate. Parking assist aka autoland gets you down. Adaptive speed control aka autothrottle controls your speed on the ground. Your aircraft then self drives to the parking slot.

Or does that take all the fun out of flying?

Back to the original question. I can't believe that 3 years later i bought a car that does all of the above. Five months on, although low mileage, it is still fun to drive. Perhaps more novel than pedal to the metal tyre screeching fun, but enjoyable at my age.

Does it blunt skills with too much automation? Probably especially as Fox said much earlier if you have learnt and got experience in the basics.

You could go fully autonomous and dispense with any pilot training. My car is not fully autonomous but in the right conditions it does take over. It will stop before hitting the garage wall. It will not release the parking brake if I have not strapped in.

Translated to an aircraft it might set a soft deck of it is not configured for landing, or might limit the manoeuvre plane, etc. Could it be made totally idiot proof?

It would have know its intended destination or endurance and refuse if inadequate fuel. It would have to do its own fuel analysis. It would need to assess their weather conditions and cross wind limits.

I guess it could be made idiot proof but it becomes no more engaging than being in the back seat of a taxi driven by an immigrant that speaks no English.