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The section on automated and autonomous control systems was fascinating. At Aurora Flight Sciences, I didn't work on this technology but knew people who did and was able to see the aircraft that had this autonomous control system technology. The company also is starting work on eVTOL (electric vertical takeoff and landing) in conjunction with Uber. Hopefully, I will be able to apply the failure concepts from these lectures to my work when I return to Aurora next summer.

 

As a pilot of manned aircraft, I would personally not trust robotic air taxis. Of course, there will likely be many redundancies in the control systems to minimize the risk of failure and also to mitigate harm or injury in the event of any injury. However, in a worse case scenario, I would prefer to be at the controls. One can only wonder how the general public would react to such technology if pilots are dubious to it.

 

Then again, the leading cause of aviation accidents is human error. A computer system should theoretically be more accurate and be able to calculate through various situations faster than a human can. As a drone pilot, I have found that the technology for self driving vehicles is in existence. The only times I've crashed in a drone were due to human error.

 

With air taxis, he challenge is in scaling up this to larger and more complex systems which then introduces more failure modes. Even though the drone technology is there, I suspect that drone designers may unconciously take less care in their designs (though in subtle ways likely) than designers of manned aircraft because the human carrying capacity has been removed for most existing drones. However, with the introduction of air taxis, the human safety factor will return.

 

As an engineer, it's important to work in teams to be able to examine challenges from different perspectives. We must also be aware of our limitations as humans because failing to do so can lead to disaster.

DRAFT: This module has unpublished changes.