Drone Drivers

[GoldenRivet]

Check out this video of a UAV crew flying a simulated mission in a training environment.

The video shows a pilot and gunner operating an armed UAV in a simulator, and shows the procedures they follow for acquiring and tracking and attacking a target.

In the simulation scenario, the UAV pilot is ordered to orbit a building where a white pickup truck is located. The white pickup goes on the move, and they are ordered to take it out.

surgical in every respect.

UAV Training Video (http://www.alexisparkinn.com/photogallery/Videos/2009-8-28-Drone-Controllers.wmv)

[Jimbuna]

Wow!....no need for pilots in the foreseeable future.

[SteamWake]

Wait.. what??? What about all those reports of indiscriminate bombing and disregard for innoncents I keep hearing about?

[Fincuan]

Interesting clip. The same pair controlled what, four UAVs(the icons on the sensor operator's screen)?

I can also easily see how this leads to innocents getting killed. Here they shoot up a simluated pick-up, most certainly without knowing why exactly. They're given the order to take it out so they do it. If the person giving the permission has screwed up, due to bad intel or any other reason, this is a very effective way to blast two honest local farmers instead of taliban. The way I see it precision is a much smaller problem nowadays than having good intel on the target.

[GoldenRivet]

Well... truth to that indeed, but in the old days they would have sent in these to hit that building where the truck was initially parked.

http://www.thehewitt.net/jpeg/bombsaway.jpg

[Weiss Pinguin]

Well... truth to that indeed, but in the old days they would have sent in these to hit that building where the truck was initially parked.
Nah, more than likely a couple of these:
http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/2917/p47thunderbolt.jpg

[Oberon]

Heh, if it were Bomber Harris he'd have sent a fleet of these:

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/multimedia/archive/01054/lancaster-bomber_1054716c.jpg

And taken out the truck, the building next to it, the building next to that, and about five blocks around it. :hmmm:

C'est la guerre

At least strategic bombing in its WWII form is a thing of the past.

[Skybird]

That is the one, polished side of the coin. The other is this:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,708314-4,00.html


The unmanned assassin can fly for more than 20 hours and kill at lightning speed. But they are not always reliable. According to official reports, 38 Predator and Reaper drones have crashed while on combat missions in both Afghanistan and Iraq, while a further nine have crashed during test flights on military bases in the US. Each crash costs the government between $3.7 million (€2.8 million) and $5 million.

The US Department of Defense accident reports show that system failures, computer glitches and human errors are common occurrences during drone missions. It seems that serious problems were ignored because of the need for the drones to be deployed as quickly as possible. The new weapon was urgently in demand following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 and the hasty start of the invasion of Afghanistan.

"The drones were not ready for going into combat," says Travis Burdine, manager of the Air Force Unmanned Aircraft Systems Task Force. "We had no time to iron out the problems." Burdine's statement is backed up by reports in the war logs. Indeed, the quiet killers seem to have a lot of defects.

Before we have fully automatted combat drones that not onyl do recce missions and ground attacks, but one day maybe also fly against enemy fighterplanes, many more years will pass by. They are no wonder-weapon, and possibly never will be.

I am not against drones in principle. I am just not enthusiastic about them, and I am against fielding them when they are in a state where their technology still is not reliable even in normal flight conditions, not even mentioning combat situations.

Other reports in that set of leaked documents seem to hint at the igh number of occasions when drone intel was unreliable, or led to misidentification of targets or bad targetting, resulting in aimed killing of civilians/non-combatants. the number of incidents when civilians/non-combatants ket intentionally targetted, obviously is much, much higher in Afghanistan than has become known to Wetsern public and media in the past years.

[TLAM Strike]

but one day maybe also fly against enemy fighterplanes, many more years will pass by. They already have with limited results. IIRC in one incident the MiG failed to hit the drone because it was so slow and the Drone miss with its missile. The second the MiG got the drone.

The new Reapers can carry AIM-9 sidewinders in addition to their air to ground stores.

[Skybird]

They already have with limited results. IIRC in one incident the MiG failed to hit the drone because it was so slow and the Drone miss with its missile. The second the MiG got the drone.

The new Reapers can carry AIM-9 sidewinders in addition to their air to ground stores.

Yes, but that is experimental so far. Before they dare to fly these thing sin regular war scenarios aginst enemy bombers that would threaten own troops if the drones fail, or navigate them with civilian traffic close by, sokme more years of developement are needed. Like the drones in Afghanistan: they do their job, but not always, and the failure rate is quite high, for my taste. as the article says, they got fielded although their develoepment still is not competed - they got fielded too early, in other words, that'S why there are so many losses of drones.

I would not like to sit in a civilian airplane if aircombat drones are flying in the area. Considering the hugh density of air traffic in some modern parts fot he world, reliability must be the major concern in drone technology. Especially if the technology is aiming at shooting down planes. Here again the leaked documents teach a lesson on ground attack drones. Obviously they cause much higher civilian losses, and on more opportunities, than gets known to the public. and due to the sensible technology and the unreliable deletion procedures of sensible data in the drone's computer brain, each time one of them goes down means that own troops must be put at risk to retrieve them, inviting the enemy for setting up ambushes.

I suspect the drone war option still is not as shiny an option as the military wants to make us believe. It is the future, most liekly, and yes, it has advanatges already now. But there are deficits, costs and unreliabilities as well.

[TLAM Strike]

I would not want to be in a Civilian aircraft when any air combat is going on whether it be between drones and manned jets or jets and jets. The surveillance and targeting systems of current drones are just about equal to what is found on current manned aircraft (Some cases better with ones equipped with ISAR). Only real diffrence is that the manned jet has a guy looking at the picture on a 5x5" screen while the guy flying the drone has a nice 26" monitor.

Reliably is a problem yes. That can be solved by either increasing the quality of drones (work out the bugs) or increase the number of drones.

I think our drones really need a "Self Destruct" for when they go down. Screw retrial. Remember the Probe Droid (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Viper_probe_droid) in The Empire Strikes Back? No Stormtroops when looking for him/it. It was comprised so it destroyed its self beyond salvage- useful in a war zone.

[Skybird]

I would not want to be in a Civilian aircraft when any air combat is going on whether it be between drones and manned jets or jets and jets.

I meant I wiuld not sit in a civilian plane even when drones are just navigating in the area even with no combat going on. When there is a malfunction in that damn thing, a software bug, whatever, there is nobody aboard to keep things under control. The operator does not sit at the end of a wire - he sits on the other side of a radiowave connection, or whatever they use for controlling it. With reliability of the things being like it currently is, I do not like so sit like a lame duck, without options if the thing goes into blind or amok mode.


I think our drones really need a "Self Destruct" for when they go down. Screw retrial.

They already have a deletion feature for the sensible software and data aboard. Problem is - again, that feature still does not work reliably.

[TLAM Strike]

I meant I wiuld not sit in a civilian plane even when drones are just navigating in the area even with no combat going on. When there is a malfunction in that damn thing, a software bug, whatever, there is nobody aboard to keep things under control. The operator does not sit at the end of a wire - he sits on the other side of a radiowave connection, or whatever they use for controlling it. With reliability of the things being like it currently is, I do not like so sit like a lame duck, without options if the thing goes into blind or amok mode. A software failure on a manned aircraft is just a deadly. It doesn't matter if the connection between the ailerons (or whatever) is by fiber optic wire or by radio wave if the "Brain" interpreting the pilots actions on the stick fails the aircraft is doomed.



They already have a deletion feature for the sensible software and data aboard. Problem is - again, that feature still does not work reliably. I was thinking more of the hardware, less if fall in to the wrong hands... again...
http://img829.imageshack.us/img829/9922/displayimage.jpg

[Skybird]

A software failure on a manned aircraft is just a deadly. It doesn't matter if the connection between the ailerons (or whatever) is by fiber optic wire or by radio wave if the "Brain" interpreting the pilots actions on the stick fails the aircraft is doomed.

It matters very well becasue a radowave connection is much more vbulenrable than a wire or fibre connection, and a human brain inside the mahcine can form an image of what is going on in an unnormal flight situation even when system fails, while the operator of a drone cannot once the comlink broke down. so the pilot in the first case has higher probabilities to take influence on the situatio, than the operator in the seconed case.

After all, there must be a reason why currently much many more drones fall out of the sky for unforseeable reasons even if they do not take enemy fire, than manned airplanes, both military and civilian, both private or commercial.

The intel gathering and ground attackl drones came first, the aircombat drones, not mentioning the fully autonomous drones, lag behind by several years. If even the first do not work reliably currently, how much less reliavbility you have in the latter - which are designed for the far more cmplicated task of air combat...? ;)

the era of drones will come. But it still is many more years away than the milizary wants to make us beleive. After all, the military must paint an optimistic picture, if it wants to secure financial funding.

[TLAM Strike]

Valid points Sky.

Personally I don't see autonomous drones in air combat (or any combat) for at least a decade or more. But remote operated air combat drones are a very possible with today's tech and need to be something we seriously consider here in the US.

Severing of Commlink between operator and drone is possible but very difficult. China or Russia might be able to jam it briefly, Iran possibly but I doubt someone group like AQ could pull it off with out finding them selves on the wrong side of an AGM-88.

You are right about so many drones crashing, right now we are in the "WWI" stage of drones. Vietnam was the "Wright Brothers" stage, today we are still learning what works and what doesn't. I think putting more drones in service only increases our knowledge and experience with them, with everyone that crashed the boys over at Lockheed etc learn a little more.

[Skybird]

Note that the intel and ground attack drones that get lost in considerable numbers in Afghanistan, are no autonomous drones AFAIK, but are remote controlled. And still they are not really that reliable. If a drone loses contact and crashes because the operator ordered it to go into a normal turn, then there are problems - big ones. Note that the producers even admits that (he gets quoted somehwrre in one of the articles I lined in the past two days), saying that due to demand they are fielded far ahead of their certified combat readiness.

[Weiss Pinguin]

Just out of curiousity, how many autonomous drones are in operation at this time? (that we know of)

[Skybird]

Just out of curiousity, how many autonomous drones are in operation at this time? (that we know of)

I do not know but I know that since years they work on autonomous drones. It started with launching, navigating and landing autonomously, and then went to autonomous combat tactics and combat manouvering. that means: after the operator gave green light the drone should decide all by itself in which way the target or threat should be countered best. The plan is to have a drone that gets launched and navigates a programmed flightplan, but during this flightplan is capable to decide all by itself what is a threat or target and what not (differ between military targetsU/enemies, and civilian contacts/non-combatants), decide autonomously on eganging the threat, and autonomously return to base when the flightplan is finished, and land autonomously.

Source: some Tv documentary on German TV, which took it over from US TV several years ago. I did not have the impression that this docu was just a cheap shot, or just a wild guessing. It sounded solid and well-founded, and gave interviews with a lot of apparently well-informed insiders.

This autonomy in differing threats and civilians is what worries me most. But when a drone is planned to move autonomously in areas where ther eis civilian traffic, may it be during exercise, may it be during take-off, approach and landing, such autonomity is inevitable if the drone shoulds do these manouvers by itself, else you need to switch back to remote control (which can fail too, as the present shows quite often).

[Radioshow]

How does a nice vid just showing a simulation turn into a argument? It was a simulation of a truck attack. Why can't people comment on the video itself and not go into a rant about indiscriminate killing.
Smoke a bowl chill.

[Skybird]

Interesting document, a roadmap of planned drone technology developement over the next 25 years. By 2025 they want to have autonomous aircombat drones manouvering with up to 9G. By 2035, such drones should outclass human pilots with a manouverabilty greatly exceeding 9G, and thus manouvering beyond what the human body can sustain. Which means total air superiority over human-flown air forces.

Also, gaining autonomous combat ability is a priority - the drone should decide all by itself when it shoots and at what.

http://ftp.fas.org/irp/program/collect/uav_roadmap2005.pdf

Militarily, I would love to have such an air force under my command. But beyond the military perspective, I am not sure that i like the perspective of any single nation having such a military capacity. It equals orbit-based ground-bombarding killer satellites that practically are beyond reach for anybody. I think neither the US in it's practical shape and form in real life (not by it's historical intention documented in old documents) nor any other nation on Earth is wise enough to handle such power with the needed sense of responsibility. If war can be waged without needing to feel any losses oneself, the option becomes alarmingly tempting. Launching them mindlessly, carelessly, even more careless than Iraq 2003, then becomes a real danger to worry about. Practically a "war en passant".

Seen that way maybe one should hope that the Chinese do not lag behind these developements for too long. Actually, they are running interesting drone programs themselves, including stealth drones.

The more I think about it, the more I indeed think that in an imperfect world like ours, such immense power needs a global counter-balance indeed. Else the fear of global war becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy - because abusing one's own onesided Über-power becomes all too tempting an option to use. even more so if politics get defined by econmic interests and get run by economic lobbyists for whom not national loyalty but anti-national corporation profit is the ultimate motive that commands their actions.

However, the pdf offers interesting material.

[Jimbuna]

Thanks for that Sky....it will take some reading but I'll get there :up: