Big Brother in the Cockpit - coming to UND!

From the Grand Forks Herald:
UND flight school upgrading safety equipment

Full Article:
http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/173727/

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Hopefully this data will be for research only, and not used against students and instructors. I can see the benefits, but this opens up a whole new can of worms in labor relations...

You scared me. I thought for a second that Dana was installing video cameras. Wouldn't surprise me.

Three aircraft will have cameras with voice recording

it is anonymous, the only time it will be used is in the event of an accident, and at that point the NTSB has it.

guess what people, all glass airplanes already do this, they are just going to use it to track trends

I hope the NTSB has some Chinese translator!

It its an xml file, just takes data from pfd.

It is a good thing for maintainence, as well as data for the school. All timestamps and n numbers are being removed

If you guys are afraid of flight data recorders in a cessna you have no business on a commercial flight deck.

“How do we end up paying for it? Students pay for it . . ."

I thought that they were trying to keep the costs down for us....

I do believe that the crash a couple years ago involving a UND Piper Seminole flying at night and the Canadian geese that brought it down had Ayidyne in it. They were able to get data recorded off the PFD and help piece together what happened. They found the Seminole went from perfectly straight and level to impacting the ground in just a few seconds. I think this stuff has already been around.. we just have really never heard about it.

Exactly what i already said, they are just going to use the data now fir statistical reasons. I don't know why everyone is so worked up about it, there isn't that much added cost other than computers to collect the data.

I would hardly describe any effect as "chilling" in 121. What the heck do you normally talk about or what regs do you so frequently break that you find having a CVR in a professional cockpit for use after an accident/incident to be "chilling"?

Lol, do you even fly for a living? I didn't think you did. Come back in 3-4 years commercial of flying and tell me what you think about the proverbial "snitch box." Glad I don't have one.

I've been flying airplanes with a "snitch box" for at least a year now (apparently, the G1000's have CVR) and have yet to have an issue.

Slightly off but on topic; the FTD room will someday have video cams watching all activies inside the training devices.

But do you fly for a living, how much time do you have, what is your experience level? The truth is that while I don't really care if there's a CVR in the machine, I don't like the idea of some arrogant bean counter telling me I could have shaved .23 minutes off of my flight by cutting some corner. And that's what a CVR let's people do if they have unrestricted access to it. If its self deleting, and only has the last 30minutes, great, but I bet UND has access to all the information about your flight. I, personally, don't want other people monday morning qb-ing my decisions after the fact. Especially at the introductory level. Look, its not a 747, frankly, you don't need a CVR.

I've been instructing at UND for nearly three years and have never had a problem with anyone questioning a decision I've made in or around an airplane. I don't understand the issue. The policy regarding the use of the information was mainly written by faculty, one who used to be a highly ranked union representative, not the airport administration. The data will be collected, but will only be downloaded during regular maintenance intervals. This means it's collected anywhere from 30 to 60 days after the fact. Once downloaded, it will be automatically stripped of times and N-numbers and will be thrown into a collective database with all the info from the other 50 airplanes. There it will be analyzed to find any safety related trends which then can be brought to the attention of the entire organization, not singling anyone out.

Apparently three aircraft will have a camera and voice recorder in them. I understand that they only loop around 30 minutes and then recycle. The policy strictly lays out what who has access to the data and under what circumstances. This is only in the event of an incident, accident. Unless you have an incident or accident, no one will ever see it.

I am not concerned and will continue to fly the airplane and instruct the same as I have over the last three years. I don't think UND is in the business of making pilots just to bust them. It doesn't sound like a sustainable business model to me. :dunno:

exactly what it is, a FOQA program