[Animats]

This is Garman SafeReturn, and this is its first real save. Here's a demo.[1] It's been shipping since about 2020, originally on the Cirrus Vision Jet. There's a lot going on. The system is aware of terrain, weather, and fuel, but not of runway status. So it gives the ground a few minutes to get ready, sending voice emergency messages to ATC. If you watch the flight track, you can see the aircraft circle several times, some distance from the airport, then do a straight-in approach. It sets up for landing, wheels down, flaps down, lands, brakes, and turns of the the engine. It doesn't taxi. Someone from the ground will have to tow or taxi the aircraft off the runway.

It's mostly GPS driven, plus a radar altimeter for landing.

The system can be triggered by a button in the cockpit, a button in the passenger area, and a system that detects the pilot isn't making any inputs for a long period or the aircraft is unstable and the pilot isn't trying to stabilize it. The pilot can take control back, but if they don't, the airplane will be automatically landed.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-ruFmgTpqA

[shrubble]

Famously the golfer Payne Stewart and the total of 6 people on the LearJet 35, died after a sudden loss of cabin pressure incapacitated everyone including the pilots. A system like this, would have detected it and possibly saved them.

I wouldn't expect a whole lot more detail, as that airport is often used by defense contractors like Ball Aerospace, who have a large office nearby.

[Animats]

There's a bit more detail today.[1] Air taxi service, plane flying with two pilots, no pax, loss of cabin pressurization, system activated automatically, crew decided to let it finish its job.[2]

[1] https://avweb.com/aviation-news/garmin-autoland-activation-c...

[2] https://www.cbsnews.com/colorado/news/plane-emergency-landin...

[3] https://www.buffaloriveraviation.com/

[jshier]

Even without autoland, I've never understood why there wasn't an emergency system to handle depressurization events when it detects no pilot input. There have been enough ghost flights, even in the last 20 years, that such a system could've saved hundreds of lives. (Helios Air 552) Automatically dropping altitude, or even just changing the transponder to some automatic value, would help.

[chartreusegoose]

Some planes have this, but planes are expensive and last a long time, so a lot of them don't.

[m4rtink]

I guess in some cases lowering altitude could result in flight into terrain or possibly entering airspace where collision with other aircraft would be more likely ?

[Mawr]

Not these days, with detailed terrain maps and GPS + GPWS.

The chances of colliding with anything else would be tiny. In case of other commercial jets zero, thanks to TCAS at the least.

[duckmysick]

GPWS = ground proximity warning system

TCAS = traffic alert and collision avoidance system

[wkat4242]

SafeReturn doesn't detect that as I understand it. It still requires manual activation by one of the passengers.

[AmbroseBierce]

It does:

> Safe Return is an emergency system designed to be deployed by passengers in case of pilot incapacitation. But Safe Return also is programmed to activate itself when it senses the pilot has become unresponsive or succumbed to hypoxia.

Source: https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2025/june/pilot...

[wkat4242]

Ah ok I was not aware of that. I have not flown a plane that had it (I did fly some with G1000 and autopilot but it didn't have this, I think it's only an option on the G3000). But I just saw about the activation button.

[stavros]

It says somewhere that the system also detects if the aircraft is unstable and the pilot has not attempted to stabilise it, or if there's no input for a long time.

[silisili]

This is fascinating.

My uncle was a pilot, and I asked him 15 years or so ago about the job. He was going on and on about computers and autopilot, claiming that pilots were only really needed anymore for takeoffs and landings, and they could sleep during the rest. Probably realizing the liability in what he said, he was quick to clarify that he didn't, of course.

In that short time span we now have a system that can land a plane by itself. Nothing less than magic, and huge congratulations and thanks to everyone at Garmin who made this happen.

[dingaling]

Even take-off doesn't really need a pilot; the production Lockheed TriStar airliner had full automation and on at least one occasion ( 25 May 1972 ) flew entirely from runway to runway, across the USA, without pilot intervention.

[snypher]

There's a little more information here if anyone else was curious;

https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/history/l...

[belter]

This was crew decision and there was no pilot incapacitated...

"Garmin Autoland Activation Was Crew Decision" - https://avweb.com/aviation-news/garmin-autoland-activation-c...

[andix]

Is there any option for passengers to chose another airport? Or for ATC to force the plane to use the next best airport? For example if the runway is under construction and severely blocked.

[arcfour]

I would imagine it is aware of NOTAMs that indicate runways being closed when it picks where to land.

It's probably a possibility in some bizarre & unlikely set of circumstances with perfect timing, but even then it's still a better outcome than flying into the ground uncontrolled. See the Gimli Glider where a 767 flown by humans was forced to make an emergency landing at a runway that was actively being used as a dragstrip during the landing—everyone survived.