Thanks but...no thanks

[Mikey]

I think I'll pass on any rides in the pilotless "drone taxi" for now.

A human-carrying drone has been given approval for test flights in Nevada, the first of its kind in the United States.
The autonomous drone - dubbed 184 - can carry one passenger and was developed by Chinese company EHang.
A prototype was shown off at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, with the company hoping to sell the drones later this year.
Experts were divided over whether such a system would have mass appeal.
Officials from the Nevada Institute for Autonomous Systems granted permission for the drone to be tested and offered to help EHang submit the results to the Federal Aviation Administration in a bid to win further approval.
It is not clear whether the drone will carry a passenger during tests.
"I personally look forward to the day when drone taxis are part of Nevada's transportation system," the institute's business development director, Mark Barker, told local the Las Vegas Review Journal.
The prototype drone is over 4ft (1.2m) tall, weighs 440lb (200kg) and has eight propellers.
It can carry a single passenger for 23 minutes at 60mph (96km/h).
Passengers enter their destination on a 12in (30cm) touchscreen in front of their seat, and the drone's on-board computer works out the best route.
There is no passenger over-ride function, meaning the user cannot take control in an emergency.
In the event of a malfunction, the drone would land in the nearest available area.
It is likely to sell for between £140,000 ($200,000) and £200,000.
Big leap
Regulation of commercial drones has proved tricky in both the US and Europe, and some doubt passenger drones will ever get off the ground.
"It feels like it is a long way off," said Douglas McNeill, a senior analyst at consultancy Macquarie.
"Drones will first have to prove their worth in less people-facing roles such as deliveries of small cargo.
"The other question is whether people will be willing to fly in a pilotless aircraft, and that seems like a big leap.
"People are sensitive to reduced journey times, and if drones could do that it would be a big plus - but I'm not sure that they can.
"Consumers are led by what regulators say are safe. And if they say these drones are safe, people might be more willing."
Dr Mirko Kovac, director of the Aerial Robotics Lab at Imperial College London, said: "Passenger drones have huge potential.
"They can decrease congestion, offer flights in challenging environments and in developing countries where the road infrastructure is not as developed.
"We don't even think about large aircraft flying over large cities on autopilot.
"Yet people are afraid of drones, some of which may use similar robotic technology.
"I think society will overcome this once the technology is more proven."

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36478614

[smackaholic]

I doubt you'd get in under the payload rating anyway, slim.

[smackaholic]

In the event of a malfunction, the drone would land in the nearest available area.

Translation, Sir Issac takes the controls and augers you in wherever he see fit.

[MgoBlue-LightSpecial]

At what altitude would these things fly? I'd be more concerned with going over rural areas where you know all the unemployed Trump supporters would make a hobby out of trying to shoot these things down for "trespassing over my property."

[Wolfman]

"EHang" ??? Interesting choice. I'll pass. Would make for great skeet shooting.

[Rooster]

Like it or not, this is the next step in transportation. Robotics are right around the corner making this the last generation where people play the primary role in driving/piloting/directing a vehicle where you want it to go. Between Google's car and the military moving rapidly towards unpiloted aircraft, the trend is irreversibly moving into the automated realm. You can expect to see robotic airliners in a few years with a human onboard to monitor the instruments and to satisfy the public during their initial worries and concerns about no one manning the controls.

[Diego in Seattle]

You can expect to see robotic airliners in a few years with a human onboard to monitor the instruments and to satisfy the public during their initial worries and concerns about no one manning the controls.

It's going to be more than a few years for that to come even close to being accepted. The first airline that suggests doing that will see their business go down faster than Pikkkle at a NAACP office.

[Mikey]

Even George Jetson had to fly his own car.

[Rooster]

Diego, that's what everybody keeps saying, but the reality is it's just over the horizon-- and that horizon is about three years off. UAVs were unheard of five years ago even though there was serious work being done to make a proof-of-concept design a flyable solution. Now? The FAA has had to incorporate a whole new set of rules to accommodate a burgeoning field that is growing exponentially. The retrofitting of aircraft to allow for robotics is a relatively easy process now. The airframe I worked with had old school actuators and push-pull rods and motors. Now the guts of these machines are minimal wiring or a dedicated wireless unit connected to a small motor to manipulate the controls-- and even that is possibly being phased out for more dynamic systems.

Seen from a perspective where the military pushes the envelope, unmanned aircraft are going to be the norm in the next major conflict. It won't just be Predators and Reapers, but unmanned medevac helicopters, high performance jet or scramjet aircraft, swarming vehicles, miniscule recon robots, and quadruped logistics bots. Weaponized robotic infantry is about 20 years out right now. None of this is science fiction, it's just the logical progression stemming from an increasingly automated world.

This automation and the information that it drives is moving far faster than our ability to harness it. Case in point: one of the reasons the next generation Commanche helicopter was discarded was that it produced too much data and information to the battlefield commander. It overwhelmed the division-level intel units with a tsunami of telemetry where the S3 and G3 shops couldn't sift through the mountains of stuff that these aircraft were producing. The intel/information discriminators hadn't been designed yet that could integrate well with the machinery that the military already had and thus caused a backlog of data. it wasn't that the helicopter didn't work, on the contrary, it worked too well.

Today the processing end of the information chain has caught up with the sensor packages that collect information. Furthermore, the different services are better aligned with each other and communicate far more effectively and efficiently than at any time previous to now. This allowed an expansion of technological advances that have pushed the combat portion of robotics to a point where they are actually commonplace. The next step is for the integration of these same technologies into civilian society in the form of automated kiosks, self parking and braking cars, classes, household appliances, and individualized marketing focus based on your interaction with all these devices and technologies. From there it is a simple and small step to unmanned airliners, and yes, civilian personal helicopters. There will always be a price point at which something becomes impractical due to the cost associated with it, but for large scale commercial enterprises? Yeah, the airline industry is on the cusp of a radical change.

[Diego in Seattle]

I think they'll have to enter into the freight section first and establish a considerable long safety record before civilians will start feeling it's safe to fly an unmanned commercial jet.

[Rooster]

It's not a stretch to see it happen rapidly. As it is, we have automated trains, subways, and rapid transit systems all over the US and nobody blinks an eye. Google cars, while notable, aren't that shocking any longer and to see one would be more of a, "Hey! Look at that! It's one of those Google cars!" moment rather than drivers veering off the road in an attempt to avoid the crazy driver-less car. Once it is done for the first time and everyone remarks at how smooth the flight went, nobody'll think twice about it afterward. Leftseater will undoubtedly agree that an autopilot will shoot a precision approach so much better than a human. So let it down another 15 feet and it'd be a full touch down approach. No big deal.

[Screw_Michigan]

It's not a stretch to see it happen rapidly. As it is, we have automated trains, subways, and rapid transit systems all over the US and nobody blinks an eye

What do all those have in common, you fucking idiot?

[Bucmonkey]

It's Rooster, let his senile ass be Screw...

[Rooster]

Screwy, you're missing it. The groundwork (sorry, bad pun) has been laid for the next field or category of transportation to begin taking humans out of the error loop. Right now you and DumbBuc are the 21st century equivilent of the farmer in his horse and buggy shaking your fist at those darn fool motorized contraptions that keep scaring his horses. It doesn't matter what you think or if you believe it's viable or not because the technology is already here.

[Left Seater]

Rooster you are correct in that when the weather is a minimums and there is a strong crosswind that I am going to have the bird in full on auto land. The difference with that and a pilotless car is I am still sitting right there and ready to take over or go around at a moments notice. On top of that the auto land can't correct for the runway incursion I see happening nor the guy in front of us missing the assigned turnoff and rolling out long.

That said I think the real issue here will be the FAA. They are struggling as it is with the airspace around NYC for example. Now you add a couple of these things and it is going to cause them to have a melt down. Granted they could assign them a ceiling of say 1000 ft but you know the FAA as well as I do. This would drive them nuts.

[Diego in Seattle]

Diego, that's what everybody keeps saying, but the reality is it's just over the horizon-- and that horizon is about three years off.

Still sticking with the premise that the public will be fine with autonomous cars in three years?

[Screw_Michigan]

Tens of thousands of people die in car wrecks each year and you're wetting your panties over one in an autonomous vehicle? Someone's has fucked up priorities.

[Diego in Seattle]

Tens of thousands of people die in car wrecks each year and you're wetting your panties over one in an autonomous vehicle? Someone's has fucked up priorities.

What is the ratio of normal cars in wrecks to those being driven on the road?

I'm betting it's not anywhere near what it is for autonomous vehicles...

[BSmack]

If it can't detect a semi turning in front of you, I'll pass.