United Pilots Get iPad Flight Manuals

 

screenshot via LogTen Pilot LogbookApps like LogTen Pilot Logbook allow pilots to document their flights on the iPad.

 

Let’s hope they don’t get distracted by a game of Angry Birds during takeoff or landing.
United Airlines said on Tuesday that it would give iPads to the 11,000 pilots who fly United and Continental Airlines planes.  The new iPads are being labeled electronic flight bags, or E.F.B., and the airline said they would completely replace the pilot’s paper flight manuals.
In a press release issued by United, the airline said that it began testing iPads as flight manuals for pilots earlier this year. Seeing benefits over paper, it now plans to distribute the tablets to all of its pilots by the end of the year. The E.F.B.’s will include aeronautical navigational charts, flight log information and other pertinent flight plan information for the pilots to access during the flight.
Two other major airlines, Alaska Air and Delta, have already deployed iPads.
The difference between the paper manuals and the new iPad version is staggering. Current paper flight manuals, which a pilot needs to carry before, during and after a flight, usually contain 12,000 sheets of paper and weigh 38 pounds. The iPad weighs only 1.5 pounds.
United said there were considerable environmental benefits from switching its pilots to all-digital flight plans. The airline currently prints 16 million sheets of paper a year when distributing flight plans to pilots. Removing the additional weight on planes will also save United 326,000 gallons of jet fuel a year, or 3,208 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions, the airline said.
Earlier this year the Federal Aviation Administration began clearing the way for a paperless cockpit. The F.A.A. began testing the iPad with smaller planes and now allows iPads through several commercial airlines as well.