FAA system wide failure going on..

[CAP1]

That wouldn't be the case either.

i don't know much about airliners, so i was only taking a stap at it.

i know our 182's with the G1000's link the gps directly to the autopilots.

[Shane]

Flying back home from cali last year, the GPS went out on the 737 and they had to fly in a new 737 in from WA cause the pilot didn't know how to fly with maps and charts 

woulda been cheaper to just fly in a new pilot.

[Golfer]

i don't know much about airliners, so i was only taking a stap at it.

i know our 182's with the G1000's link the gps directly to the autopilots.

Keep in mind the autopilot has several modes.  Pitch/Roll is the most basic.  Heading is a step up.  NAV using either a ground based (VOR/LOC/ILS) or an RNAV (Usually GPS these days) generated signal.  Losing the GPS is not a show stopper in most cases (and surely shouldn't be in the case of a professional crew operating the airplane) except when dictated by the approved MEL or the company's procedures.

[CAP1]

Keep in mind the autopilot has several modes.  Pitch/Roll is the most basic.  Heading is a step up.  NAV using either a ground based (VOR/LOC/ILS) or an RNAV (Usually GPS these days) generated signal.  Losing the GPS is not a show stopper in most cases (and surely shouldn't be in the case of a professional crew operating the airplane) except when dictated by the approved MEL or the company's procedures.

the last i think may be part of it.

 in nj, cap has 4 cessna 182's. 2 of them are the glass cockpits. cap specifies how they are to be flown. one of the major things they state is that if it is at all possible, autopilot is to be engaged at 500ft agl, and let it do the work for you. (of course the pilot is/will monitor the aircraft too)

 i figured that may have been part of the case about the airline flight. they may want it autopiloted from a certain alt. i guess it's really hard to say though, as there could have been any number of other things wrong with the aircraft to ground it.

[Golfer]

Again company specific.  I don't know first hand of any airlines that can't MEL the autopilot and personally have flown several legs on different occasions without a working autopilot.  Where things get picky and you can have a show stopper is with the flight director and how it is INOP.

It's one thing to have an SOP for how you operate the airplane which is what seems like you're using in the 182s.  I don't engage autopilots or yaw dampers below 1000' as a personal technique and the 500' number might also be a limitation with the aircrafts autopilot.  Having not flown a G1000 for any meaningful amount of time and never in a 182 I expect that might be the case.  Regardless losing a GPS is not a grounding item for an aircraft especially a modern airliner in use in the USA.  Besides there are hundreds of airplane flying around in scheduled airline service that don't even have an autopilot installed in the first place...

[trigger2]

I never trusted any of the passengers.

See they make poop up like this when they don't even know what a Minimum Equipment List is or what it has to do with their flight.

No, they had us loaded up ready for take off, on a "delay", then over the intercom, he then proceeded to say that, "Do to the fact that the GPS was out, and he did not know how to properly fly with maps and charts, they would be bringing in a new plane from WA and it should be a 2-3 hour delay"... so no, I'm not "making this up" I'm going with what I am told...

[Golfer]

No, they had us loaded up ready for take off, on a "delay", then over the intercom, he then proceeded to say that, "Do to the fact that the GPS was out, and he did not know how to properly fly with maps and charts, they would be bringing in a new plane from WA and it should be a 2-3 hour delay"... so no, I'm not "making this up" I'm going with what I am told...

Well you're either making it up or you misinterpreted a very much tongue in cheek comment.  I don't buy the latter would come out of the mouth of a professional flight crew member even in jest so I'll be going with the former.

[Sandman]

Keep in mind the autopilot has several modes.  Pitch/Roll is the most basic.  Heading is a step up.  NAV using either a ground based (VOR/LOC/ILS) or an RNAV (Usually GPS these days) generated signal.  Losing the GPS is not a show stopper in most cases (and surely shouldn't be in the case of a professional crew operating the airplane) except when dictated by the approved MEL or the company's procedures.

There are MELs that require GPS?

[Golfer]

There are MELs that require GPS?

I don't know of any and didn't specifically say there were.  If there are airworthiness issues requiring GPS for whatever reason that's where they'd be.

Right out of what you quoted...

Losing the GPS is not a show stopper in most cases (and surely shouldn't be in the case of a professional crew operating the airplane) except when dictated by the approved MEL or the company's procedures.

[trigger2]

Well you're either making it up or you misinterpreted a very much tongue in cheek comment.

My apologies for sharing an experiance with the AHII community, and my apologies for just LOVING to be cooped up in my room all day thinking of "made up stories" I can tell, so far I'm at about 450ish...

For all I know the GPS in the 737-400 coulda just been about to exploding releasing a catastrophic explosion throughout the hull of the aircraft... but... for some reason I really don't think that woulda happened...

And as you said... a professional crew... who's to say these guys weren't freshly hired? Or that they hadn't flown with maps and charts for so long that they didn't feel comfortable flying with them and running the risk of 'getting lost' (Radar/ATC should take care of that problem shouldn't it?)... I don't know the full extent of it, I know what was relayed to me, which, wasn't much...

[CAP1]

Again company specific.  I don't know first hand of any airlines that can't MEL the autopilot and personally have flown several legs on different occasions without a working autopilot.  Where things get picky and you can have a show stopper is with the flight director and how it is INOP.

It's one thing to have an SOP for how you operate the airplane which is what seems like you're using in the 182s.  I don't engage autopilots or yaw dampers below 1000' as a personal technique and the 500' number might also be a limitation with the aircrafts autopilot.  Having not flown a G1000 for any meaningful amount of time and never in a 182 I expect that might be the case.  Regardless losing a GPS is not a grounding item for an aircraft especially a modern airliner in use in the USA.  Besides there are hundreds of airplane flying around in scheduled airline service that don't even have an autopilot installed in the first place...

yes, this is true.....

[CAP1]

Well you're either making it up or you misinterpreted a very much tongue in cheek comment.  I don't buy the latter would come out of the mouth of a professional flight crew member even in jest so I'll be going with the former.

that might depend on the airline too though. when i fly southwest, they seem to almost always have some "tongue in cheek" humor.

i think one of my favorites where when landing at orlando. the flight was delayed a few minutes leaving philly, and the people were kinda anxious to get off. the pilot is taxing up to the terminal, and people are unbuckling, and starting to get up. the pilot(or some other crew member) comes over the pa system with  """we're not quite to the terminal yet, but will be in just a few seconds. please remain seated."" followed with "" wait for it.......wwaaitt foorrr it.....waiitt fffooorr iiitttttt...........OK GET THE HELL OFF OF MY PLANE!!!""""" the last as the tube was brought to the fuselage, and the dor opened.

 it was one of the funniest things i had heard from a flight crew. most passengers were laughing pretty hard.

[CAP1]

Again company specific.  I don't know first hand of any airlines that can't MEL the autopilot and personally have flown several legs on different occasions without a working autopilot.  Where things get picky and you can have a show stopper is with the flight director and how it is INOP.

It's one thing to have an SOP for how you operate the airplane which is what seems like you're using in the 182s.  I don't engage autopilots or yaw dampers below 1000' as a personal technique and the 500' number might also be a limitation with the aircrafts autopilot.  Having not flown a G1000 for any meaningful amount of time and never in a 182 I expect that might be the case.  Regardless losing a GPS is not a grounding item for an aircraft especially a modern airliner in use in the USA.  Besides there are hundreds of airplane flying around in scheduled airline service that don't even have an autopilot installed in the first place...

i guess it's somewhat different in the airlines than it is for us little guys too. when i fly, regardless of whether i'm familiar with the airspace or not, i do always have a gps with me, besides the one in the aircraft. i never ever use either of them, though for primary navigation. that's what my eyeballs, charts, and VOR's are for.
 i tend to use the gps to verify what everything else is showing me, especially if i'm near any restricted airspaces.

[CavPuke]

The reason for the system wide delays was the failure of a flight plan processing software facility http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headline/nation/5966863.html . Unfortunately when former Administrator Marion Blakey took over the agency she changed the Fix before Failure policy for critical ATC equipment to a Fix on Failure policy now in effect.  FAA techs used to perform preventive maintenance prior to her "stewardship" on critical components such as ILS, Vortacs, etc, not any more folks.  She also dumped a very robust and redundant land line communication system (leased from private company) to an FAA owned system with no redundancy, hence multiple failures such as happened at Memphis, Miami, L.A. Center and ad nauseaum . She is also the one that pushed the FSS privatization fiasco and instituted a B scale wage for controllers which has resulted in a wave of very experienced controllers retiring as soon as they are able.  Prior to her appointment in 2002 the agency was a very good place to work, since the imposed work rules of September 2006 it has become one of the worst agencies in the U.S. government. 

[SD67]

"Hello, we're from the FAA and we're here to help"