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iPad App Issue Delays 'a Few Dozen' American Airlines Flights

Inthraller said:
I bet it's a connection for another flight.
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That's probably the case. There are probably not allot of direct flights out Austin. Here in California, if you want to fly out of Ontario Airport, you have to take a super short flight to someplace like Las Vegas or Phoenix before connecting to the flight to your ultimate destination. I hate it, as I have sinus/ear problems which means my ears have endure ascent and decent twice in a short period.:mad:
 
Airlines are usually required to have tons of redundancy systems. Surely they would have multiple backups for this as well? Otherwise I don't really like the idea of my pilot needing iOS 8 to keep the plane on track, haha.
 
With over a half dozen software updates to IOS 8.X since its release, I'm not thrilled to learn American Airlines is using iPads in the cockpit. I guess even the FAA drinks the Apple cool aide.
 
bmunge said:
Sounds like poorly written software. The fact that it's running on an iPad is largely irrelevant.
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Are you kidding, who's to say the problem is not IOS related or a combination of the application and IOS. All the Microsoft haters are so quick to bash Windows when a Windows based app crashes. So the fact that it is running on an iPad (e.g., IOS) may certainly be relevant.
 
FrankieTDouglas said:
Wait, what?! That's a three hour drive. Factoring in arriving and exiting an airport, waiting at the gate to board, and the flight itself, there's no time saved. Maybe even time lost.
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I had the same reaction. The only thing that I can think would make it make more sense is that it was the last leg of a connecting flight from somewhere else, given that DFW is big hub.

Edit: looks like someone beat me to it
 
Vanilla Face said:
To add to this, the fact it went out on numerous iPads simultaneously points to a server or network error.
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That does not simply point to a server or network error, or anything else in particular. What is does say is the problem appeared across several iPads deployed within American Airlines. The problem could easily be the application(s), IOS, hardware/firmware, or yes ... even a server and/or network error just to make you happy.
 
Airline flights

Maybe we should let Airline pilots do some beta testing on their iPads or take part in the beta testing before each update. This way the developers will get first hand experience and know what they missed and can fix the issue.
 
Ahhh! I missed an ":apple: scandal". There wasn't one for long time. On a (far) more serious note what bothers me is how FAA approved it in the first place. What sort of testing did they do and what sort of backup measures did they require?!
 
calzon65 said:
That does not simply point to a server or network error, or anything else in particular. What is does say is the problem appeared across several iPads deployed within American Airlines. The problem could easily be the application(s), IOS, hardware/firmware, or yes ... even a server and/or network error just to make you happy.
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Given the information provided it does seem more likely to be either an application or network problem.

Connecting to WiFi wouldn't have fixed it if it were hardware and it's unlikely that many would have experienced hardware failures concurrently.

I would also presume they are all running the same image which has probably been in use for some time. To me this suggests it's not iOS or the firmware since it either would have happened before or (again) not happened across so many units simultaneously.

Anything's possible, most things are just very unlikely.
 
Is everyone here an idiot or do they not realize the first iPad has not had a software update since iOS 5.1.1?
 
In before ironic sentiments regarding the safety of using computerized maps to navigate while pretending the jet itself is like a fancy wooden sky canoe.

... bah, I was too late.
 
bowler357 said:
I had the same reaction. The only thing that I can think would make it make more sense is that it was the last leg of a connecting flight from somewhere else, given that DFW is big hub.

Edit: looks like someone beat me to it
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DFW is a major hub for American Airlines. If you're flying on American to almost anywhere in the south, you're likely to route through DFW. This flight is not for someone who lives in Dallas and wants to go to Austin. This flight is for people from potentially dozens of other far flung cities, including many international destinations, who all need to fly to Austin, but don't have direct flights from their origin cities to Austin. I myself took this exact flight from Oklahkma City to Austin once, with a brief stop and plane change in DFW. As much as people hate the idea of flight connections, if airlines didn't operate a hub-and-spoke system, the airline system would only serve the largest markets and smaller airports would get very few flights.
 
gkarris said:
Over 100 years of flying without an iPad now we can't fly without one... :eek:

:rolleyes:
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Imagine the sheer bravery of Orville and Wilbur daring to fly without waiting for the iPad to be invented.

As for network issues being a problem, that could have still been an iOS / iPad failure somewhere. Can't tell you how many times I've had my iPhone drop from the wifi network and had to fiddle with deselecting and reselecting the wifi network to get the iPhone to reconnect.

Additionally, there should be redundancy in the cockpit of a plane. What if the connection fails mid-flight? What if they lost radio contact and the network? Pilots should have the ability in-flight to operate an airplane safely without an iPad.

I have no problem with them using these devices for convenience. But the iPad should not be essential.

It's a good thing the iPad's just went blank though. I'd hate to see what would have happened if they switched over to Apple Maps ;)

What this event does demonstrate is that this technology or implemented system is not safe for use in a mission critical environment (regardless of where the error occurred.
 
Two things: A) Isn't there a backup system available in case of problem like this? B) Consumer electronics as a mission critical aviation data source sounds like a very bad idea. Design a iPad like aviation equipment which is meant to run 24/7 with extremely high software and hardware robustness and you can rely on it. Sure, it will probably cost $10K per unit but you get what you pay for.
 
Airlines, as well as many state owned facilities usually tend to utilize older software, because of stability. They've got huge IT that do all this testing and when they reach a stable version, they keep it. I can bet you 100$ that they're NOT running iOS8. Especially if what another guy in here said was true, and this was the 1st gen iPad.

The checkin counters at most airports, boarding desks, they're using Win98. They're way out of support but again, that's why they've got these enormous IT teams. I'm not saying the HW is old, it's just the software running inside a VM on that machine to ensure compatibility.
 
Considering that the app replaces 40 lbs of paper manuals, is it too much of a stretch to assume that they don't reference it in the middle of a damn flight?
 
Yeah, long distance air and water transport are two applications where it's FOOLISH not to have paper charts. People always want to test fate until they get a painful and usually dramatic reality check. Are we really very smart to be relying so heavily on smart devices?
 
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