The Influence of Artificial Intelligence on Aviation — FlySafair Goes Beyond the Cockpit

In a scene reminiscent of a Hollywood blockbuster, an airplane finds itself in distress with no human pilot at the controls, yet a heroic figure manages to enter the cockpit. While this scenario once belonged solely to the realm of fiction, advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) prompt the question: How close are we to AI-piloted flights? Kirby Gordon, Chief Marketing Officer at FlySafair, offers insights into this captivating topic.

Though autopilot systems have long been reliable fixtures in aviation, the era of fully autonomous AI-piloted aircraft remains on the horizon. Nevertheless, the rapid progress in AI technology is significantly reshaping the aviation landscape. Like numerous other sectors, AI’s impact on aviation is most pronounced in two key areas.

Firstly, AI can autonomously handle routine tasks, typically requiring human supervision, thus liberating individuals to focus on more complex endeavors. Secondly, AI’s ability to analyze vast datasets is unmatched. Even more remarkable is its capacity to extract insights from this data, facilitating more informed and strategic decision-making.

However, this technological advancement isn’t heralding a new industrial revolution; rather, it’s refining the current one, enhancing efficiency and service quality in aviation. For example, airlines such as FlySafair, KLM, and United are leveraging AI for customer service, promptly delivering accurate responses to inquiries across various digital platforms.

Changi Airport in Singapore recent incorporation of AI technology also exemplifies the potential use of technology. Their integration of AI during check-in and boarding processes has eliminated the need for human intervention. This means human employees are freed to tackle more cognitively demanding tasks or complex processes.

The excitement continues beyond customer interaction. AI’s data interpretation skills are revolutionising preventative maintenance. Flight data is recorded and interpreted by airlines for every flight, offering a wealth of detailed information on the intersection between aircraft performance and operating conditions.

The premise of preventative maintenance is to utilise this data so that maintenance issues can be identified before they arise and, thus, proactively addressed before they result in a flight delay. The historical challenge is that the data set is vast. While the professionals working in this area have made incredible strides, it is very challenging to keep an informed overview of so much input. This is where AI-driven technology really shines, scouring over this data in fractions of the time, with a degree of thoroughness not known before, to spot trends and surface the insights that may have previously been overlooked.

Another area in which this capability will have a remarkable impact is cost optimisation regarding schedule efficiency and fuel burn dynamics. Currently, airlines are required to build intricate models that analyse vast quantities of data to perform this kind of complex analysis. The insight advantage and data crunching capacity of generative AI will play a fundamental role in optimising airline operations into the future, reducing costs and emissions. This will not only be good for consumers and the environment, it will also be excellent for safety thanks to additional insights into prudent planning.

While the reality of Robopilot may still be some while off, the impact of AI on modern aviation is already being felt. The aviation industry has only scraped the surface of the potential advantages that AI could provide to airlines and the improvements that it could offer in both their operations and customer service.

A big sore point in the AI conversation, especially in SA is how AI is going to take people’s jobs. It is important we balance the conversation by including some points on job creation.