There is an aviation old joke that in the future the airplane will have a crew of two, a pilot and a dog. The pilot to feed the dog and the dog to bite the pilot if he tries to touch anything.
I started this article after reading about United Airlines plan to bring in all 12,000 of its pilots for additional training outside of their normal training schedule. This was being done as a result of several incidents that raised concerns about pilot response to failures. Continue reading
Here in Seattle we’ve had several interesting incidents/accidents with personal UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) or drones.
In one case a person flew their UAV into the Space Needle, no damage and no one was hurt; at a parade an operator lost control and hit and knocked out a parade attendee and the operator was cited by police; UAV stuck on power lines over a lake, result – power turned off and UAV recovered at a cost of $35K and the operator was not found; and just recently a UAV was flown into the Ferris wheel on the waterfront, no damage to the wheel though a table on a nearby deck was destroyed. Continue reading
“To the best of my knowledge today, this was not a corporate decision,” he said. “This was a couple of software engineers who put this in for whatever reasons and I would also like to find out.” Continue reading
One of the keys to a successful project is having a set of requirements that are well defined and stable. We’ve all worked on projects where a lack of defined and controlled requirements has led to scope creep which result in schedule delays. Continue reading
The recent news reports on the hacking of the Fiat Chrysler Jeep U-Connect system creates new worries for manufacturers, engineers, drivers, government agencies, and insurance companies. A recall is underway to upgrade the software on the Jeeps, never thought I’d hear about a car being recalled for a software fix, and I’m sure this won’t be the first. Continue reading