Still Another Airplane Crash AI Should Have Prevented

WASHINGTON - July 1, 2026 - PRLog -- An airplane crashed into a truck at Raleigh-Durham International Airport on Wednesday.

That was only the latest in a string of crashes involving airplanes.  But virtually all could have been prevented, says Professor John Banzhaf of George Washington University.

The professor, an MIT-educated engineer with two U.S. patents, notes that AI can help air traffic controllers do what they can't do:
■ monitoring the dozens of different relevant aviation radio frequencies, including commercial, military, government, helicopter, small craft civilian, ground transportation, and radios from nearby airports, etc.
■ inputting and including in its analysis the inputs from both ground and air radar, and video cameras at the airport
■ incorporating precise maps of the airport including all runways, taxiways, service roads, etc.
■ using all of the above information to determine, in real time instantaneously, the present position, velocity, and trajectory of all vehicles in the air and on the ground
■ and then calculating various flight paths, trajectories of planes taking off or taxiing, movements of all ground vehicles, etc.
■ so that it can utilize simple predictive programming to foresee all close calls (near misses) and possible crashes in fractions of a second
■ and then alert an air traffic controller if there might be a possible problem such as a potential collision.

Using AI to reduce airplane collisions, as well as the escalating number of potentially-fatal near misses, was apparently never even evaluated.

Fortunately there is something which can be up and running - and be operational at all major airports - much sooner, and at a cost far less than to simply update Newark's (or any other individual airport's) outdated equipment (Newark still relies on floppy disks), - argues Professor Banzhaf.

An already-available desktop computer using an AI program could provide a significant increase in air traffic safety - it would be like having a lightning-fast eidetic genius looking over the shoulder of each air traffic controller.

If smaller and less complex AI programs can already drive cars, they can easily perform the much simpler task of computing flight paths and potential collisions, Banzhaf argues.

Indeed, at GWU it has been demonstrated that AI programs can listen to and understand airplane radio communications, and use what it heard to compute flight paths, he says.

Professor Banzhaf's detailed analysis of how such a supplemental warning system could work has been featured in many reports including::

Let's Try Using New AI to Reduce Airport Runway Incursions (https://www.valuewalk.com/lets-try-using-new-ai-to-reduce...) AND
AI Programs Can Easily Monitor Radio Traffic, Detect Objects, and Analyze (https://www.valuewalk.com/lets-try-using-new-ai-to-reduce-airport-runway-incursions/)

Fortunately, the professor is no longer alone in calling for testing and using AI to making flying safer.  As just a few examples, consider: [LIST}

http://banzhaf.net/   jbanzhaf3ATgmail.com   @profbanzhaf