AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2020 - 60

D

uring this first-ever
autoland for me, nothing felt terribly out of
the ordinary until the
final 100 feet or so,
when it finally sunk in
that in a few seconds
we would be hitting the pavement and
no one had their hands on the yoke. But
just as briefed, the airplane "decrabbed"
from the 10-knot left crosswind and soon
plunked us down just left of center on
Runway 18 at New Century AirCenter in
Olathe, Kansas, and then quickly tracked
us back to the centerline. A few seconds
later we rolled to a stop. I looked left at
Eric Sargent, Garmin flight test pilot,
who smiled broadly from the left seat of
the Piper M600. "What do you think?" he
asked.
"Stunned," I said. "That's pretty
amazing."
And such was my introduction to
Garmin's new autoland system, a first in
general aviation.
The system is the newest addition to
a family of automated flight technologies
that Garmin has dubbed Autonomí. After
60 | AOPA PILOT January 2020

the introduction over the past few years
of the two other parts of Autonomí-
Emergency Descent Mode (EDM) and
Electronic Stability and Protection
(ESP)-autoland is the next logical step.
Combined with autoland, they form
what is basically a digital parachute
for the pilot and passengers. If a pilot
becomes incapacitated or disoriented, the
systems take over either automatically or
when activated by the pilot or a passenger, first stabilizing the airplane and, if
necessary, landing it.
ESP debuted several years ago and is
basically an always-on autopilot that only
kicks in when the pilot attempts to stray
outside the flight envelope or if the pilot
does not respond to keep the airplane
flying safely inside the envelope. It will
gently nudge the flight controls to keep
the airplane out of over- or underspeed
situations and to limit bank angle. If a
pilot fights ESP for a period of time-as
one might if disoriented in the clouds-
the system turns on the Level mode of the
autopilot. If the pilot doesn't turn it off
after a period of time, the Autoland system
turns on and begins the landing sequence.

The pilot can deactivate Autoland a number of ways, including by touching the
Autopilot button on the autopilot mode
controller or by hitting the red autopilot disconnect button on the yoke. If that
happens, a message pops up on the multifunction display on how to reactivate the
system in case a passenger inadvertently
disconnects it.
Meanwhile, EDM kicks in when the
pilot hasn't interacted with the panel
or flight controls within a certain time
period. It first poses the question on the
cockpit displays: "Are you alert?" If no one
touches a button on the panel, it assumes
the pilot is incapacitated and descends to
a breathable altitude and levels off. In the
case of a pressurization problem, it activates immediately.
BUT THEN WHAT?

Well, now, with certification pending for
Autoland on the M600 SLS and shortly
thereafter on the Cirrus SF50 Vision Jet,
the Garmin panel goes to the next step
of beginning an automated sequence of
events that results in a safe touchdown
on a runway, where it rolls the airplane to
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2020

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