On Oct 26, 10:18 am, KAE wrote:
There has been some recent discussion (and I use that word loosely)
about the diffrerences between flying a real aircraft, an RC aircraft
and the MS flight simulator or any simulator for that matter.

One type of flying not brought up was what seems to be a hybrid of
those, the unmanned drone such as the Predator that was recently
deployed by NASA to help fight the fires in California. Flown by a
"pilot" (can you call him a pilot?) sitting in a building at Edwards
AF base it seems this could be a very difficult type of flying. The
pilot was interviewed on NPR a couple of days ago and commented that
when he first was learning to fly the drone, his instructor told him
that it's like flying a real airplane but without 4 of your 5 senses.
There is no sound of the engines to give him any feedback, no sense of
feel to give clues about attitude or performance, no sense of smell or
taste that could indicate something is leaking or burning. All of the
required sesory input and data is processed only with visual cues.

I have been doing a little research on the 'net, but can't yet find
any information on how they actully fly the drone. Does the pilot see
an image through a camera much like the view you get with a single
monitor in MSFS. Are there multiple cameras? Do they pan around? Or is
everthing flown IFR by instruments?

What about ATC and flying in and around commercial and GA traffic? Do
they contact ATC centers and airport approach controls? How would they
communicate with ATC? Would it be via telephone since the standard
radio frequencies are not going to work from a ground based station to
another far off ground based station?

I've spoken with many of the Predator pilots. They fly out of Beale
which is down the street from me. Yes, they do talk to ATC by a GPS
relay on the aircraft. The aircraft has *NO* TCAS or avoidance gear
(although has an extra bay for one). As a result anytime the plane is
flying over the area the FAA requires a TFR the entire time its up
(since its single engine it may have to return). The take off and
landing is done local (Beale, Iraq, etc). The enroute is *ALL* flown
from Beale. They said its not stick and rudder flying, its point and
click flying. They only have a limited camera for looking for other
aircraft and basically say there is *NO* see and avoid possible.
Right now there are pilots in Beale AFB in California flying missions
over Iraq.

-Robert