After having taken both Systemic Evaluation of Air Traffic and Future Air Transportation Systems with Prof. Schiefele, I thought I’d leave some of my impressions together with my protocol for FATS. In general, I enjoyed both lectures and would definitely take them again. I did SEAT first, which I think helped a little with FATS. It’s not required, but it does provide some helpful context. I’d describe SEAT as “What does aviation look like today?” and FATS as “How will aviation change in the future?”. Personally I think SEAT is more relevant, as the content of the lecture seems like something that everyone working in aviation should be familiar with. In terms of what the lecture is like, as well as difficulty, both lectures are very similar. I got a 1.0 in both exams with roughly 120h of effort for each, which includes any time spent on the course (so also lectures or the oral exam itself). I also studied more extensively than is required, looking into topics I was interested in more deeply. As such, the 4CP seem very appropriate.
One thing I would recommend anyone considering taking either exam do: If at all possible, go into the lectures. It’s not like you can’t pass without them, but you’ll have a much easier time if you do. The 1.5h of lecture are definitely worth their time. Prof. Schiefele likes to ask questions (he asks the room, he doesn’t pick specific people) and discuss topics. These, as well as anything he says, are relevant for the exam. Some questions that get frequently asked in oral exams are nowhere on the slides. At first glance, this seems like it would make preparing for the exam really hard, but overall it’s the opposite. Not only will the questions give you a good idea of what he will ask you during the oral exam, you’ll also get a good idea of what is actually important for the exam. He finished 10 slides in 5 minutes? Ehh. He spends 10 minutes discussing a single slide? Better remember that one. Sometimes he’ll even throw in a “If you haven’t realized it yet, I’m preparing you for the exam right now”, which is absolutely true.
Go to the lecture, take notes, try to participate in the discussions. You’ll get a better grade with less effort.
Here’s the grades from the WiSe23/24 FATS module as of today.
The average grade is worse than any other oral exam I've taken. SEAT had a similar distribution, so I'd assume this is the norm. Personally I don't think this is because the exam is harder or grading is less fair, but because getting a very good grade without attending the lecture is more difficult when compared to other lectures.
The exam is an oral exam like any other. Questions are passed on if someone doesn’t know them.
Our questions were mostly regarding lectures 1 (Introduction), 2 (Legal Framework) and 6 (Autonomous Aircraft). I’m certain I forgot some questions, but here’s the ones that I remember:
- Explain Digitization, Integration and Automation. Give examples for each.
- Name internal and external sources of change.
- What is structured data?
- Name some visions that we have in the aviation industry. (Fly the Green Deal, SESAR, NextGen)
- What does SESAR stand for?
- What are the goals of SESAR?
- Who are the stakeholders of SESAR?
- What methods to predict the future do we have?
- Explain the technology radar.
- Why do companies need to predict the future?
- How far does Airbus/Boeing have to look into the future?
- Why that far?
- Could we have forecast COVID? Explain.
- Which of the methods could we have used to predict COVID?
- What method might the mensa use to predict the future?
- We’ve seen a lot of graphs that forecast from zero historical data. Can we trust these?
- How much historical data do we need to forecast one into the future?
- What should regulations be like? (Transparent and easy to navigate, Encourage innovation, Protect the public from unintended consequences, Efficient by use of emerging technologies)
- What are five principles to guide regulation? (Adaptive, sandboxes, outcome-based, risk-weighted, collaborative)
- Explain what adaptive regulation means.
- Explain what a regulatory sandbox is.
- Explain the pacing problem (Regulation lacks behind technological change)
- How does “business” fit into this? (It’s in the middle. Regulation follows business follows technology.)
- Explain the innovators dilemma.
- Give an example for the innovators dilemma.
- What will likely be the first use case for PAVs outside of leisure? (Airport shuttle)
- Which airports? Will it be Frankfurt? (No. Congested cities like New York and Bengaluru)
- Roadmap for AA (eMCO → SiPO → Command and Supervision via Ground Stations → AA)
- eMCO (Reduction from 3→2): Why do some flights need more than two pilots on board right now?
- SiPO: Why will it likely require a Ground Station? (Backup, pilot could become incapacitated.)
- There are two main approachs to RCO. Explain them. (Replacement and Displacement)
- Explain the 1:n problem.
- How many aircraft will one ground operator be in charge of?
- What used to be the role of the pilot? What is the role of the pilot today? (ANC+S. Used to be Aviate and Navigate, now is mostly communicate and manage systems.)
- How is the role of the pilot going to shift in the future?
- What is situational awareness?
- Why does situational awareness present an issue for RCO?
- What types of automation bias are there? Explain them.
- What is the difference between automation and autonomy?
- Give an example outside of aviation for automation vs autonomy.
- What are the opportunities of autonomous aircraft?
- JAL516 accident (We covered this one because it happened during the current semester, might not be part of future lectures)
- What happened?
- What might we learn from this? (Speculation, because accident analysis wasn’t finished yet)
- MH370 accident
- What happened?
- Why did we know where to search for the a/c?
- What changes were implemented because of this accident?
- At the end, each one of us got a picture and some specifications for a certain futuristic aircraft (In our case an autonomous cargo aircraft, an airship and a quadcopter PAV)
- Advantages/Disadvantages
- What is the business case?
- Would you invest?