Can a plane practically fly itself?

Let's say hypothetically that a pilot hates his life and co-worker and kills himself and his co-pilot in the cockpit. Could the plane fly itself to safety? What are the limitations of what it can/can't do?|||First lets talk about general aviation airplanes - There have been cases, (and I personally know of one), when the pilot fell asleep and woke up after the plane had ran out of fuel and landed on a farmers field. No injuries to the pilot but the plane was damaged. So, it is possible.





As to a large airplane, (airline) - it would be possible if everything worked perfectly - the airplane on autopilot holding a heading and altitude. When it runs out of fuel it would continue to hold the heading and since it would not be able to maintain altitude, it would slow down and descend. If there was an area long enough for it to land, no obstructions, no crosswinds, etc...right in it's descent path, then it is possible that it could land and passengers would survive.





Possible? Yes - Likely? No.|||it totally depends on whether the auto pilot is on and set correctly as well as what what auto-pilot system is being sed on the flight. If the auto-pilot is sophisticated and is correctly calibrated to the GPS system and the correct runway is selected, yes it can land itself. However, the speed of entry etc. must be known before the pilots become inactive.


In conclusion, yes a plane can fly itself as well as land at a runway if the AP is sophisticated enough and is set thoroughly, which is extremely likely for a pilot to set the whole flight plan in auto pilot because it would be a waste of time. Also, the journey would be extremely unsafe because the aircraft wouldn't be a ble to change altitude to adapt to changing terrain and close flying to airports and other aircraft.|||Short answer NO!





In the unlikely event that you describe, the airplane will fly itself until one of the following.





If the MCP Altitude wasn't reset before the untimely death of the pilots, It will fly at the current altitude to the last waypoint on in the CDU, and then enter heading hold until it runs out of fuel.





If the MCP altitude was set to some lower altitude, say the ground:


1) There is a thing known as a route discontinuity. This is where the arrival doesn't exactly hook up to the approach. In this event, it would descend to the altitude specified at the last waypoint before the route discontinuity, and then enter heading hold at that altitude, and fly til it ran out of fuel.


2) Suppose the route hooks up to the approach, then it would fly the approach, and descend to the airport altitude, and kill everyone. Why? Because the nav system will still be using IRS and GPS for navigation, and you need multiple autopilots tracking an ILS signal to get autoland to work. Plus the whole autoland system has to be set up and armed. The airplane would probably be off course by a 1/4 mile or so, the gear wouldn't be down, the flaps would be up, so the speed would be around 230 kts, and it would probably take out a big chunk of the airport.|||The autopilot can bring the aircraft to its destination. Sophisticated ones can land the plane, but pilots like to do this themselves. They are pilots, after all, because they like to fly planes.





Most aircraft will fly straight and level hands-off, unless they are disturbed by turbulence or other factors. Try it: load up something like a Cessna 152 in your favourite flight simulator, taxi out to the end of the runway, hit the throttle and see what happens.|||A plane cannot do this today. Planes have autopilots that can certainly fly the plane and we've had autoland for years however there still needs to be a pilot telling the autopilot what to do. The missing pieces to your scenario are primarily 2 things: 1) How do you detect that the pilots died? and 2) Making a smart enough system to pick the closest airport, go to it and land without any human interaction. Believe it or not, people have thought about answers to those questions. Not because they are worried that pilots will shoot themselves in the air but because of the situation where a pilot passes out at altitude due to a plane loosing pressurization or a pilot who died due to a heart attack and the only person left in the plane is his non-pilot wife. There have been all kinds of proposed solutions to the 1) question: Having the pilot where some sort of o2/heartbeat meter, force him/her to press an "I'm still alive" button every once in a while, assume the pilot has passed out if no buttons have been pressed in a given time period, wait until there is just enough fuel left in the plane and automatically take over, etc.





While some may consider your specific scenario silly, technology is being worked on to solve other problems that could actually lead to a plane automatically taking over (due to an incapacitated pilot) and automatically landing itself safely in many years from now. About as close as we have to this today would be the case where the pilot passes out, the plane runs out of fuel and starts to slow down (because it is trying to maintain it's cruising altitude) and the autopilot prevents the airplane from stalling. Instead, it trades altitude for airspeed and keeps the airplane flying all the way down to the ground (hopefully, the pilots wakes up before then). This is something that's not found in a lot of airplanes although it will be more common in the years to come.|||can a car drive itself? yeah, its possible. But the same reasons they don't let cars drive them self is why planes don't fly themselves. theres other people and objects that are not fixed in place that have to be accounted for. san diego does test on the side of the road for cars that drive by itself. i see it all the time. just testing it out. for what, i have no clue.





But i doubt those cars would ever make it on the rode, they can't account for peoples actions who driving besides them. just like a auto pilot wont be able to account for peoples actions around them





and the landing? the landing involved so much speed, altitude and other things. you have to see things with your own eyes and go from there.





if both pilots die, and nobody is in the cockpit you are going to die.|||I think recent history should answer that for you. Couple of Northwest Pilots overshot the destination by an hour because they weren't paying attention. ( http://www.startribune.com/local/6561936鈥?/a> ) Did the aircraft land? Nope, not until the pilots told it too! Even with autopilots and "autoland aircraft", someone has to TELL the automatic systems when and what to do, that would be the pilot and or co-pilot. Without them the plane just keeps flying till it runs out of fuel, don't ask what comes next. Very few aircraft even have the "autoland" ability when you look at the entire fleet.





Can systems be designed that could take over and fly in the event you depict? Yes, but they are years away and not anywhere near ready for "prime time".|||New military aircraft can take-off, fly, land, and even taxi themselves, the pilot is only really needed in combat situations and obviously training exercises, but if, for whatever reason, the pilot is unable to fly the aircraft, it can do it itself.|||There have been instances (documented-Payne Stewart) where the crew have become incapacitated or bailed out and the aircraft kept flying until it ran out of fuel.





Some people should check their facts before giving sarcastic and abusive answers. Even if the question is inane.|||Practically yes....





Between trim and the autopilot, auto land and modern navigation systems.. Its technically possible.|||Practically, "yes." In actuality, "No."|||Yheys they an andaitamksl asjtei ajsl, how they can mwehe gjop hgiri airplanes can they can athe can they ocautla e.|||So, are you planning on committing a homicide or just hijacking an airplane?