Page 4 - AAA MAY - JUNE 2013 Online Magazine

CONTENTS
AErIAL VIEw

CREDITS EDITOR’S NOTE

EdItOr
JEREMy TORR bAcK tO tHE fUtUrE
jeremy.torr@gbp.com.sg
Two things grabbed my attention this month – and neither is headline news. but
ASSOcIAtE EdItOr combined, they may completely alter the way we look at and manage our industry.
JOSEPHInE PAnG
josephine.pang@gbp.com.sg
First, Solar Impulse completed a couple of night-time flights across the American
ExEcUtIVE pUbLISHEr & cEO heartland relying purely on the stored solar energy it managed to gather during
vITTORIO ROSSI PRUDEnTE
vittorio.prudente@gbp.com.sg the day. Second, a report from MIT followed up by a slew of news stories about
cOO & mArKEtINg dIrEctOr, ASIA unmanned commercial aircraft. The first was basically a publicity exercise
SIvA SACHI for Swiss technology and the organisations that sponsored the design and
siva.sachi@gbp.com.sg construction of the massive twice-A320-sized aircraft that uses lots of carbon
Art dIrEctOr composites, some very high-tech electrics, lots of lithium batteries and some
ARTHUR CHAn 12,000 solar panels on its upper wing surfaces. It’s no Gossamer Albatross,
arthur.chan@gbp.com.sg
weighing in at 1.6 tonnes (car weight) but it is highly efficient, using only four
wEb dIrEctOr 10hp motors to keep it moving. Despite flying all through the night, the aircraft
ELMER vALEnCIA
elmer.valencia@gbp.com.sg had battery power to spare when it landed next day. Amazing stuff.
cIrcULAtION mANAgEr
kHAIRUL nAEM The second news blast featured pilots such as Chesley Sullenberger who landed
khairul.naem@gbp.com.sg his A320 in the Hudson River; Mary Cummings, MIT’s director of Humans and
AdVErtISINg rEprESENtAtIVES Automation Lab, and ex-general and drone pioneer in the Israeli air force Isaac
EUROPE, MIddLE EAST, SOUTh AfRIcA & ben-Israel. All, with slightly different angles, agree that the degree of airborne
SOUTh AMERIcA automation for many routine tasks is likely to increase markedly.
COnTACT: vITTORIO ROSSI PRUDEnTE
TEL: +39 049 723 548 FAx: +39 049 856 0792
MOb: +39 335 611 9295 As Cummings rightly points out, most planes today use fly-by-wire technology
EMAIL: vittorio.prudente@gbp.com.sg that separates pilot input from the surface activators – and are managed by
ASEAN, PEOPLE’S REPUbLIc Of chINA, TAIwAN, software. “The controls are digital, not analogue. Everything is done electronically
hONg KONg & AUSTRALASIA
COnTACT: SIvA SACHI so you don’t need a person in there to push a hydraulic actuator,” she said in one
TEL: +603 778 12903/2909 FAx: +603 778 12915 interview. So to a degree, we are already flying in computer-controlled aircraft.
MOb: +601 2905 6825 We are certainly riding in unmanned transit trains at most airports, and have
EMAIL: siva.sachi@gbp.com.sg
SOUTh ASIA – INdIA, PAKISTAN, no problem jumping on potentially dangerous fairground rides with no man in
SRI LANKA, bANgLAdESh & NEPAL uniform at the front of the machine to tell us the altitude and speed. Some of
COnTACT: vInOD GHAnSELA you even trust your car to park itself. So why the worry about fully automated
MOD: +91 9810806939 aircraft? It’s coming, that’s definite.
EMAIL: vinod.ghansela@gbp.com.sg
USA & cANAdA
COnTACT: JOSH MAyER but to me the key thing with these two threads is not the discussion they promote
TEL : +1 972 816-6745 FAx : +1 972 767 4442 on safety or practicality, but the opportunity they offer. It’s a little like bill Gates
EMAIL : jm@mayeradvertising.com offering his DOS operating system to IbM. The hardware was Ok. The software
SwITzERLANd was Ok too. but together, they were cataclysmically powerful – so powerful
COnTACT: RObERT ROTTMEIER
TEL : +41 216 174 412 FAx : +41 216 170 921 they changed the entire way the world works today. Solar-powered auto-piloted
MOb : +41 792 104 466 aircraft have the potential to completely do the same for aerial transport. Aerial
EMAIL : robertrottmeier@bluewin.ch
density levels would rocket, costs would plummet, ATM systems would become
ISRAEL standardised and airports would open up in previously uneconomic areas – and
COnTACT: TAMIR ESHEL there’s a fair chance accidents would not increase either.
TEL : + 972 544 508 028 / +972 989 117 92
FAx : +972 989 199 65
EMAIL : eshel_tamir@yahoo.com Feel like a glimpse of the future? Go buy a quadcopter kit off the internet.
you will be amazed...
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