Technology is great until it breaks.

I have a pretty bad fear of heights. I guarantee you I will never set foot in anything like this.

Why? It has it's pluses, you know.

I like the pictures posted with the thread, looks like good background pics for my monitor.     -- Ace --

Flying by instruments (only) has been around a long time.  This is an enhancement of that - but an expensive one?

Actually cheaper, since windows on airplanes require special metals and support. Also, it's not really flying by instruments. That refers to being in zero visibility conditions. If anything, observation is enhanced. Also, radar guided landing isn't necessary...any more than any regular aircraft.

It'd be very unlikely the cockpit wouldn't still have glass.  Windowless cockpits were tried a few times...for supersonic military aircraft....forward view via periscope...[aerodynamic/tech necessity]... but convincing wobbly Joe Public to travel in a plane at the best of times doesn't always go well...and to think the potential existed where-by the pilots could be BLIND would be an absolute commercial deal-breaker....

Jafo

reply 7

It'd be very unlikely the cockpit wouldn't still have glass.  Windowless cockpits were tried a few times...for supersonic military aircraft....forward view via periscope...[aerodynamic/tech necessity]... but convincing wobbly Joe Public to travel in a plane at the best of times doesn't always go well...and to think the potential existed where-by the pilots could be BLIND would be an absolute commercial deal-breaker....

I agree. Windows will always remain for pilots because in the worst case scenario where your instruments fail you want to know the pilot can at least see where he is going.

Cameras also make a vulnerable point. a small lens is easier to foul up than a window. While structurally stronger, if something goes wrong with it you end up blinded.

As a replacement for passenger windows I can see it working, but I doubt they'd ever use it for the pilots.

windowless + sun = radiation

Once they invent transparent aluminum structural integrity won't be a problem. As for cameras I agree with Jafo. When all else fails being able to see where you are going is a good thing.

Indeed. When one looks at the pics in the OP, and the description...it's clear (sorry, the pun just happened) that it's the cabin whose walls are screens.

I isolated the following pic from the video:

and enhanced it a bit in Camera RAW. One can see that the cockpit windows exist as being 'darker' than the surrounding body.

From the OP: