2015考研英语阅读英文原刊《经济学人》：无人驾驶飞机

　　2015考研英语复习正是强化复习阶段，考研英语阅读在考研英语中占了40分，所以考研英语阅读是英语科目中重要的一项。新东方名师范猛老师曾建议过考研生需要坚持每天泛读10-15分钟的英文原刊。强烈推荐了杂志《经济学人》.杂志中的文章也是考研英语的主要材料来源.希望考研考生认真阅读，快速提高考研英语阅读水平。

　　Pilotless aircraft

　　无人驾驶飞机

　　This is your ground pilot speaking

　　呼叫，这里是你的地面飞行员

　　Autonomous civil aircraft could be flying beforecars go driverless

　　民用飞机会先于汽车实现无人驾驶

　　WITHIN the next few weeks a twin-engined Jetstream will take off from Warton Aerodrome inLancashire, England, and head north towards Scotland.

　　在接下来的几周里，一架双引擎飞机喷流将会从英格兰兰开夏郡的沃顿机场起飞，向北飞往苏格兰。

　　Like any other flight, the small commuter airliner will respond to instructions fromair-traffic controllers, navigate a path and take care to avoid other aircraft.

　　与其他班机一样，这架小型通勤客机将会根据空中交通管制员的指示，沿着一条航路飞行，注意避开其他飞机。

　　But the pilot flying the aircraft will not be in the cockpit: he will have his feet firmly on theground in a control room back at Warton.

　　但是驾驶这架飞机的飞行员却没在驾驶舱里：他在沃顿机场的一个控制室里驾驶着飞机，双脚仍然稳稳地踩在地面上。

　　Pilotless aircraft are now widely used by the armed forces, but those drones fly only inrestricted airspace and conflict zones.

　　无人机现在已广泛应用于军队之中，但这些无人机仅用于在禁飞区及冲突地区。

　　The Jetstream mission is part of a project to develop the technologies and procedures thatwill allow large commercial aircraft to operate routinely and safely without pilots in thesame skies as manned civilian flights.

　　而喷流的任务是某个技术及程序开发项目的一部分，该项目的目的在于能让大型商用飞机在没有飞行员的情况下安全的进行常规飞行，与有人驾驶的民航班机在同一片天空中飞行。

　　Fasten your seat belts

　　系紧您的安全带

　　To reassure those of a nervous disposition, the test flights do not carry passengers andpilots remain in the cockpit just in case things go wrong.

　　为了让那些神经质的人安心，测试的飞机不会有乘客，驾驶舱中仍然有驾驶员以防万一，

　　In that way they are similar to Google’s trials of driverless cars, which have drivers insidethem to take over if necessary while on public roads.

　　这有点类似于谷歌无人驾驶汽车的实验，在公路上行驶时，如有必要，车中的驾驶员可以控制汽车。

　　Yet unmanned commercial aircraft are likely to enter service before people can buyautonomous cars.

　　但是无人驾驶的商用飞机很可能在人们可以买到无人驾驶汽车前便能投入使用。

　　Modern aircraft are already perfectly capable of automatically taking off, flying to adestination and landing.

　　现代的飞机已经完全有能力进行自动起飞，自动飞往目的地，自动着陆。

　　These tests are trying to establish whether they can do those things safely without a pilot inthe cockpit and at the same time comply with the rules of the air.

　　而要进行的测试是想确认在驾驶舱没有飞行员的情况下，飞机能否在遵守飞行规则的同时，还能安全的完成以上三件事情。

　　Progress is being made, a conference in London heard this week.

　　笔者本周从在伦敦召开的一次会议上获悉，事情正在取得进展。

　　It was organised by the Autonomous Systems Technology Related Airborne Evaluation andAssessment, the group staging the British test flights.

　　本次会议是由机载无人系统技术评审组织举办的，就是该组织在英国进行了无人机测试。

　　This 62m programme, backed by the British government, involves seven European aerospacecompanies:

　　该项目获得了英国政府的支持，投资达六千两百万英镑，共有七家欧洲的航空工业公司参与其中：

　　AOS, BAE Systems, Cassidian, Cobham, QinetiQ, Rolls-Royce and Thales.

　　机载观测系统公司，英国宇航系统公司，凯西典公司， 科巴姆公司，奎奈蒂克公司，劳特莱斯公司及泰雷兹公司。

　　It is potentially a huge new market.

　　这是一个潜在的巨大新兴市场。

　　America’s aviation regulators have been asked by Congress to integrate unmanned aircraftinto the air-traffic control system as early as 2015.

　　美国国会已要求该国的航空协调员要在2015年将无人驾驶飞机加入空中交通管制系统。

　　Some small drones are already used in commercial applications, such as aerial photography,but in most countries they are confined to flying within sight of their ground pilot, much likeradio-controlled model aircraft.

　　有些小型无人机已经应用于航拍等商业用途，但在大多数国家，小型无人机的飞行范围被限制在其地面飞行员的视野以内，很像无线电遥控的模型飞机。

　　Bigger aircraft would be capable of flying farther and doing a lot more things.

　　再大一点的无人机能够飞的更远一些，可以做更多的事情。

　　Pilotless aircraft could carry out many jobs at a lower cost than manned aircraft andhelicopters—tasks such as traffic monitoring, border patrols, police surveillance and checkingpower lines.

　　无人驾驶飞机可以完成很多工作，并且比有人驾驶的飞机和直升机成本更低，比如说交通监测，边境巡逻，警务监视及电缆检查等任务。

　　They could also operate in conditions that are dangerous for pilots, including monitoringforest fires or nuclear-power accidents.

　　无人机还可以在对飞行员有危险的环境下工作，包括监视森林火灾或核电事故。

　　And they could fly extended missions for search and rescue, environmental monitoring oreven provide temporary airborne Wi-Fi and mobile-phone services.

　　而且无人机还可以执行更多的任务，如搜索救援，环境监测，甚至提供临时的机载无线网络和移动电话服务。

　　Some analysts think the global civilian market for unmanned aircraft and services could beworth more than $50 billion by 2020.

　　有分析师认为，到2020年，无人驾驶飞机及其服务的全球民用市场的价值可超过500亿美元。

　　Whatever happens, pilots will still have a role in aviation, although not necessarily in thecockpit.

　　无论发生什么，飞行员仍会在航空业占有一席之地，虽然不一定是在驾驶舱里。

　　As far as the eye can see there will always be a pilot in command of an aircraft, saysLambert Dopping-Hepenstal, the director of ASTRAEA.

　　在可以预见的未来，飞机一直都会由飞行员掌控， ASTRAEA的主任Lambert Dopping-Hepenstal说，

　　But that pilot may be on the ground and he may be looking after more than one unmannedaircraft at the same time.

　　但飞行员或许会留在地面上，有可能同时照看好几架无人机。

　　Commercial flights carrying freight and express parcels might one day also lose theiron-board pilots.

　　运送货物和快递包裹的商用飞机某天也可能会失去其随机的飞行员。

　　But would even the most penny-pinching cut-price airline be able to sell tickets to passengerson flights that have an empty cockpit?

　　但就算廉价航空公司再怎么精打细算，它能把没有飞行员的飞机的机票卖出去吗?

　　More realistically, those flights might have just one pilot in the future.

　　更现实点说，未来的商用飞机可能只有一名飞行员。

　　Technology has already relieved the flight deck of a number of jobs.

　　飞行班组的许多职位已经被技术取代了。