Where was a ‘pilotless’ plane flown?
Picture used for representative purpose only
For the first time in history, a plane was flown without a pilot over Britain — and it is touted to be the future of the aviation industry.
The plane, which completed a 500-mile trip from Lancashire to Inverness, made history as the pilot flicked a switch and handed over the reins to a controller, seated at a computer screen on the ground, many miles away, reported The Daily Mail.
This concept might make people uneasy, but the prediction is that commercial jets might be flown via remote control regularly in another five to ten years. The U.K and the U.S. have been using unmanned military drone aircraft for several years, but the next generation of pilotless planes has been designed not for war purposes, but for passengers and cargo!
The test flight over the UK was due to the Astraea project: the Autonomous Systems Technology Related Airborne Evaluation and Assessment programme, funded by industry and the Government.
Flying ‘Test Bed’, as the plane has been nicknamed, will be able to fly in British airspace with absolutely no human involvement, though it can’t travel with humans yet. The cameras in the cockpit and under the plane check the skies for weather and feed info back to the computerized navigation system. The aircraft’s progress is always overseen on the ground by an operator who is given the images taken by the cameras. The operator can override the plane’s computers and fly or land the craft by remote control if required. But if contact is lost, the plane is programmed to land safely all on its own.
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