US Navy remotely lands F/A-18 Super Hornet on carrier deck

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/us-navy-remotely-lands-fa-18-super-hornet-on-carrie-447225/

by el_duderino • 8 years ago

109 71 8 years ago

jordache2• 8 years ago

hmm is that such a feat? landing on a carrier compared to landing on land? The variables involved should be pretty predictable and can be modeled accurately...

philip12093• 8 years ago

It's a moving runway

flr03• 8 years ago

The track is narrow and short, with potential movements in 3 dimensions.

jonathanstrange2• 8 years ago

That doesn't make much of a difference, given how fast the plane moves.

Being accurate enough in turbulent weather to catch the hook seems to be the main problem.

bkohlmann3• 8 years ago

Add in a pitching deck and all predictable variables go out the window.

jordache2• 8 years ago

i would venture to say this is more of a controlled environment than autonomous vehicles. The variables you have to deal with in real-time for vehicles is much greater than landing on a carrier.

anonymousDan• 8 years ago

I can heartily recommend 'The Right Stuff' by Tom Wolfe, where he gives a great description of how challenging it is for new pilots to learn this skill.

chomp• 8 years ago

Another: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gGMI8d3vLs

moftz2• 8 years ago

There is more involved with landing on a carrier vs a land runway. The carrier deck is much shorter so the plane needs to grab the arresting cable and there is only a small window for this. If you miss it, you need to quickly speed up and take off again for another pass.

alistairSH• 8 years ago

you need to quickly speed up and take off again for another pass.

In fact, the aircraft always go to max throttle at touchdown, just in case they need to go around for another try. This, as opposed to going to max throttle after realizing there's a problem.

ape4• 8 years ago

I wonder if they do model the movement of the deck.

vermontdevil• 8 years ago

Ocean swells is quite a variable to deal with on a carrier deck

verandaguy_alt• 8 years ago

It definitely is a feat. Carrier landings on US-supercarrier-style carriers especially are pretty notorious -- between the ocean swell, the short runway and tiny margin of error, plus a runway that's actually angled with regards to the carrier's direction of travel, it's pretty challenging.

Steve44• 8 years ago

plus a runway that's actually angled with regards to the carrier's direction of travel, it's pretty challenging

I hadn't really considered that before. Say the carrier is doing 20 knots then even on a one minute final approach the carrier will have moved by getting on for half a mile. ( very much fag-packet estimated maths but enough to show you can't just point at the carrier and land in a straight line)

Merad• 8 years ago

The US Navy has actually had automatic carrier landing systems since the 1960s. The advancement here appears to be the carrier "taking over" the plane in order to land it with no input from the pilot.

bkohlmann3• 8 years ago

This is interesting. I’ve been out of the cockpit for about 5 years, but we had what we called “mode 1” approaches back then where the carrier would lock onto our f-18. We could land without touching the controls. At the end of my time, they actually incentivized us to fly these approaches more frequently to develop unmanned systems more quickly. (Incentive was giving a perfect grade for a landing...usually Mode Ones were a “no count” in the grading rubric.)

I guess the difference here is that an actual person (the LSO) is controlling the jet vice the computer?

moftz2• 8 years ago

I'm not really sure what the benefit of having a remote operator landing the plane vs having a computer do it. I guess the remote pilot can be the third tier in who can land the plane (in-seat pilot, computer, ship remote pilot) and for UAVs (UAV pilot, computer, ship remote pilot). Is the automated landing system that crappy that they want to add in a remote operator? If they can already land a plane automatically, the the next step they should focus on is an automated air traffic control, landing and launching any planes within the 5 mile radius (assuming that doesn't already exist). Imagine a smaller carrier like a LHD totally devoted to UAVs that launch and land without anyone on the tarmac.

icegreentea22• 8 years ago

I think the idea is that UAV operators/pilots might not even attempt landings. There's a future where assume control of UAVs as they approach station, and release as they return to base.

In that scheme, they were probably expecting the UAVs to land automatically on the carrier, with something like ATARI being the backup.

This way they can leave their operators focusing on mission tasks instead of recovery.

philip12093• 8 years ago

I suspect that landing on aircraft carriers is a skill that they do not want people to forget. For example, the military has recently started teaching officers celestial navigation because GPS can be jammed [1].

[1] https://www.npr.org/2016/02/22/467210492/u-s-navy-brings-bac...

dfsegoat• 8 years ago

Yes, my impression is the LSO can correct / guide it in ultimately.

However, I am wondering what happened to all of the technology that they put together for the X-47B - which I believe was fully qualified to land itself in most weather conditions:

https://www.naval-technology.com/projects/x-47b-unmanned-com...

btw: Thanks for your service.

dmix2• 8 years ago

yep:

During testing, the ATARI system operators controlled an F/A-18 aircraft using a joystick, while a safety pilot sat in the cockpit as backup. The technology is capable of taking over an aircraft from up to five miles away.

lallysingh• 8 years ago

ATARI system? Is this post a few days old?

neverminder• 8 years ago

Aircraft Terminal Approach Remote Inceptor. An unfortunate choice of an acronym, yes, just like KGB (Knowledge Generation Bureau) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Generation_Bureau

burnte• 8 years ago

Or, as I suspect, an intentional acronym.

borgchick• 8 years ago

As soon as I saw ATARI, I thought this has gotta be an April fools day joke, then I saw it wasn't posted on the 1st, then I was confused...

MBCook• 8 years ago

April 1st would be when they announce they’re dropping it for the COmbat Landing w/Electronic COntrol system.... COLECO.

smoyer2• 8 years ago

It's an interesting choice of wording when they say the LSO can "take over" - I hope the encryption is strong enough that LulzSec doesn't also "take over" a military aircraft.

goldenkey4• 8 years ago

Wouldn't existing drones be using similar, albeit lower powered communications?

Jesus_Jones• 8 years ago

What could go wrong with remote control technology over our important military assets? Of course the answer is a lot, especially in wartime. For all the paranoid people thinking that the military or police or whatever US security service will take over the country in a secret coup, the people who make up those forces are an important bulwark against tyranny from within or without.

It's very dangerous to be a pilot and a soldier but as a software engineer I don't know how I could ever feel safe in a world without people making decisions about how to use weapons.

smoyer2• 8 years ago

Yes ... and Iran has already claimed to have taken over one of the (at the time) most technologically advanced U.S. drones - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incid....

desireco422• 8 years ago

Just wait till Iranians or someone like that hacks into this, like they already did to one US drone.

dmix2• 8 years ago

It's not autonomous like a drone, it's controlled by human(s) on the aircraft carrier with a pilot in the cockpit. It's also being billed as a "backup system" for safety (to correct course) and for emergencies.

desireco422• 8 years ago

It still opens it to hacking, as much as people don't want to hear it. Essentially you have system for remote operation and if it can be hacked, then it can be used to direct the plane.

tfha2• 8 years ago

If you can remotely control something, so can your enemy.

jimrandomh• 8 years ago

Not true. Cryptography does work.

stouset3• 8 years ago

Cryptography works, but the implementations are frequently flawed.

Plus, things like this introduce systemic risk where an adversary can take over multiple aircraft simultaneously, or at least render them all inert midair.

jessaustin• 8 years ago

...if your enemy has the same auth keys that you have. At which point, your enemy can probably do all sorts of nasty things.

dingo_bat3• 8 years ago

I would bet it is easier to take control of a human piloted plane by faking the controllers radio signals, than doing the same with a robot.

US Navy remotely lands F/A-18 Super Hornet on carrier deck

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