Just weeks ago, Alaska Airlines went paperless in their cockpit with respect to their flight manuals by issuing iPads to their pilots.  They also expect to replace their flight charts by adding those to the iPads as well.

Now American Airlines is moving a step forward with that by testing iPads to replace pilots charts.  All of this is being done under the FAA’s Electronic Flight Bag program and it’s good for everyone involved.

The move saves airlines big money on paying for paper chart updates and saves big weight on the aircraft because each pilot carries as much as 30lbs of paper in manuals and charts.  Multiply that by the number of pilots on board and it really can save fuel costs too.

And I like it because it’s time to use technology like this more.  Are the iPads the right tool?  Why not?  They are fairly robust, long lived in battery life and much easier to carry.  But if the iPad proves not to be quite robust enough, Panasonic makes a fully ruggedized tablet PC now and if it is good enough for the military, it’s certainly good enough for a pilot.

Filed under: Airline News by ajax