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Comment by thisacctforreal | Hacker News Reader

The idea of there being a layer of software between the pilot's intentions and the aircraft's control input freaks me out.

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that's exactly what airbus does... there are a set of "laws" that govern flight at different stages of flight "normal, ground, flight, flare, alternate 1, alternate 2, direct, and mechanical" quite complex systems, that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_control_modes

And this is what contributed to the crash of AF 447.

That said, I prefer either the older boeings, with minimal computer interference when hand flying or the Airbus approach. Because Airbus at least appear to know what they are doing.

This Boeing-Airbus chimera isn't really working.

The stories where the computer stops the human from doing something stupid and saving the day never makes it in the news.

Doesn't that describe fly by wire systems which describes most planes these days?

Most fly-by-wire systems implement the pilot's stated intention directly, though, is that not correct?

This layer inbetween where the computer goes "actually what I think you REALLY meant to do is..." is novel in the 737 Max.

No. The intended behavior is a nose down nudge every 10s only when a) exceeding a certain angle of attack b) above a certain altitude and c) when flaps are retracted. It's second guessing only at a particular edge of the normal flight envelope to prevent it from departing that envelope.

And all the various layers of protections in fly by wire airplanes do that - they second guess certain inputs to prevent edge cases. But in any case the input is going through software abstraction. Any apparent directness is part of that software behavior.

I'll be interested what the software update due at the end of April entails exactly. I think every airplane should get the angle of attack sensors disagree indication, standard.

An intrinsically dangerous plane that needs either much more careful piloting (hard to sell...) or software assistance (bad idea) should freak you out even more.

I would recommend against boarding any Airbus than.

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