The tragic unsolved disappearance of Malaysia Airlines MH370, and the two-year search for the black boxes from Air France AF447 has focused the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and the airline industry to adopt new standards for position reporting. Starting in 2018, airlines will be responsible for tracking aircraft every 15 minutes, and by 2021, the standard will include minute-by-minute autonomous tracking of aircraft in distress.
Modern commercial airliners are filled with backups to the backups, all designed to get us to our destination safely and efficiently. There are multiple autopilots and flight control systems, secondary hydraulic and electrical systems and two engines. The pilot and co-pilot are even server different meals, so should one of them come down with food poisoning, there is always a backup. Operators of communications satellites face similar demands in maintaining service, which are compounded by the orbital location of their satellites: over 22,000 miles above the equator.
Inmarsat’s I-5 F4 satellite thundered into space yesterday evening, carried by a SpaceX Falcon 9 booster. In a picture-perfect evening liftoff, the rocket launched at exactly 7:21 p.m. (EDT), precisely at the beginning of the launch window.
