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Politics : America Under Siege: The End of Innocence -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Trumptown who wrote (1481)	9/13/2001 5:25:02 PM
From: Rob S.	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 27666

Thanks for the clarification (we'll hash this communication thing out). That would be serious threat but it still is not complete. The security system is a loop: The avionics component, that part contained within the aircraft, is in continuous communication with the ground base stations and with communications satellites. To or more of these stations randomly become part of the authorization and command loop. Each ground base station (airport tower or separate facility housed bellow ground level) receives as part of the total data a video stream of both the pilot and co-pilot (could be just an empty chair) from the cockpit. Iris and/or other authentication verify the pilot initially with the primary or local originating system (which the pilot clears every day). But say the pilot was planted years in advance. His flight has filed a flight plan. If he deviates from the flight plan the security, integrated flight control avionics system alerts both of the two or more ground stations. If they see that the plane continues to veer off course and the pilot is unable to give an acceptable explanation or if the ground stations both agree to over-ride the pilot, control is taken over and the airplane is returned to the authorized flight path. In the event of an emergency where re-routing of the flight is necessary, an alternate flight path can be set in by the two base stations. If one or both of the base stations becomes inoperative, one or two more will be randomly chosen and given flight authority. During this entire time the pilot is out of the loop. Today pilots do not land most of the time. The auto-pilots take control on the final approach. Crash and ground proximity avoidance and over-ride systems are currently available and are increasingly being used. These would be part of the package that would become required. You need the crash avoidance to prevent veering into the path of another aircraft. The similar ground proximity (ground prox) system capability can be set to issue audible and visual alerts or it can take control to lift the nose of the plane or veer the plane to avoid obstacles such as a mountain or a building. If such a system was in use during the WTC disaster and could not be turned off by the pilot and/or co-pilot, the WTC Towers would have been missed. It would still be conceivable to crash the planes by shutting down all primary and redundant power systems and killing primary flight control systems. That would leave the plane dead in the air. The newer aircraft including the B-777 have "fly-by-wire" in which there are redundant communications paths and electro-mechanical actuators but where there is not an individual hydraulic or cable control system for each flight surface and other control point. There still is a central and secondary (back-up) hydraulic system in various sections of the plane. Although there is double or more redundancy built into the systems, "fly-by-wire" planes Achilles heal is power. So if you took out all primary and secondary power systems throughout the entire plane it would become a glider at best. Given sophisticated and orchestrated actions, you can completely disable an airplane. But that makes it very difficult to use as a guided bomb. Take away the control system and actuators and you lose the ability to steer the plane and in many cases even maintain its course. Worst case scenario in a plane using what I conceive of as possible for a security system: The pilot gains access to the plane and takes off. He could not have gotten access as a passenger because the plane would not authorize him even though he is recognized by the base security system as a generally authorized pilot. Only one pilot and co-pilot are authorized at any one time. Again, that is verified in real-time through iris (as good as finger prints but when combined with video recognition is even more secure because you can't cut off the persons head or kill him and still have him look the same as you might be able to do with finger or hand print recognition (some newer finger print systems also measure pulse and electro-magnetic activity to eliminate the ability of a dead finger or hand posing as the person). Sorry to cut this short but I've got my ear to the phone.