- Written by Rob Vanasco
When we board an airplane, we put a lot of trust into people and technology that we really don't get to see. There's the pilot in the cockpit doing pre-flight checks. We usually don't see him until we are getting off the plane, yet we trust that he is there, that he has all his mental faculties in order, and that he know what he is doing. There's the airplane itself, tens of thousands of functions and calculations being done to make sure this giant hunk of metal stays airborne. None of us stop to check any mechanical parts of the plane or question why there is duct tape over a section of rivets. There's the navigation system and communications devices that connect us to the people and technology that not only know where we are going, but knows where every other plane in the sky is so we don't hit them. We trust that all these people and systems are working together. After all, we can't even see out the front window!