Re: [OT] Another airplane missing in sea

Frank Adam wrote:
On 30 Jun 2009 08:41:24 GMT, "Paul-B" <paul@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Ian Rawlings wrote:

On 2009-06-30, Frank Adam <fajp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Strange though.. AFAIK, most larger passenger planes will have a web
uplink nowdays for the passengers. That could surely have a GPS
locator tied to it with the data sent to regional hubs. Just 30-40
bytes or so; time stamp, plane ID, heading and position. All that is
needed.
But i'm guessing that whoever are working on it, are trying to
create a full on tracker, which would send a whole lot of other and
mainly useless[1] information.

[1] for the purpose of finding a downed plane quickly, that is.
They could probably glue a system together that encoded GPS data into
parts of the TCP/IP packets, e.g IP IDs or sequence numbers, that's if
they use TCP/IP on the uplink, which they don't need to and quite
possibly wouldn't as it's not optimal for any situation, it's
generic. It'd be a fingers-crossed system though, if it worked,
great, but if it didn't work then oh well such is life, and I don't
think airlines like that kind of thing ;-) Making it all reliable and
predictable is harder.
Too many chances for error in a patched-together system which hasn't
been extensively tested under every conceivable circumstance.

I maybe alone on this, but if i was in for a plane crash, i'd like to
be told by the pilot on the way down that there is a reasonable chance
that the locator system would've told the rescuers where we are.. Just
in case we survive it, we might not have to die slowly. As opposed to the pilot saying "Bad news is we are lost and screwed
without any hope of a rescue, so hope to die on impact. And let me
just say in these last seconds of our descent, that we WERE going to
install these patched together things, but Paul told us not to. The
good news is that a much better one will be implemented in the oh,
next few months, years, whatever. Anyway, i hope your remaining
families will fly with us again."
I am with you Frank. Let us say there is a reliable GPS and we need to send the data to some application through the network uplink the planes have for internet connection. I think even if you are to send 10 network packets over TCP and half of them get lost we can build a sufficient acknowledgment packets on top of TCP/IP to make sure that it is better than the current one which will send a signal once in a blue moon - I was really shocked to read the Air France crash were there were no signals at all for, what 30 minute, 50 minutes?

and the result of that reliable system - ? They searched thousands of sq. km for weeks with navies and aircrafts of at least 3 nations.

Let them build a reliable system - but that should not be an excuse not to make some emergency patch up as a back up to the current system.

I did some search, and could not get concrete data on number of passenger flights currently in use. But it looks like there are around 20,000 commercial aircrafts in use all around the world. That is not a huge number. Even if we assume that it will double in 10-15 years I think they should be able to get sufficient dedicated channels if required.

Sreeku

.

Relevant Pages

  • A Fresh BFR and A Peek At The Future
    ... that need to make better friends with the trim wheel and don't try to muscle ... An amazing distillation of what's around you and what your plane is doing ... without a GPS and I'll take having a GPS anyday...) ... situational awareness to an increadible level. ...
    (rec.aviation.student)
  • Re: AM radio reception inside passenger planes?
    ... So here is another URL we hope you read about GPS ... AM/FM radio receivers are generally prohibited. ... > You guys are acting as if the engines and flight control surfaces of> an aircraft are intimately tied to the plane's radio receiver, and the> slightest odd or out-of-place signal that it receives is enough to ... So I guess the feeble> radiation by my FM radio is enough to> cause a plane to dive into the ocean, but the guy next to me putting> out 3 watts of near-microwave energy is totally safe. ...
    (sci.electronics.equipment)
  • Re: Is GPS working inside a BOEING/Airbus airplane ?
    ... where the greatest number of satellites are likely to be seen. ... This shows a GPS track recorded from the starboard side ... of the plane was facing north, the GPS lost satellite signals. ...
    (sci.geo.satellite-nav)
  • Re: Is GPS working inside a BOEING/Airbus airplane ?
    ... where the greatest number of satellites are likely to be seen. ... This shows a GPS track recorded from the starboard side ... of the plane was facing north, the GPS lost satellite signals. ...
    (sci.geo.satellite-nav)