AIN Blog: So Long, It’s Been Fun iPad 1

ForeFlight recently sent out a notice warning customers that after January 3 next year its popular aviation app will no longer be supported on the original Apple iPad 1 and iPhones through model 4. "We strongly encourage you to make sure your primary device is at least an iPad Air, iPad mini 2 or iPhone 5,” the company wrote. 

Coincidentally, John Zimmerman, editor-in-chief of the Air Facts blog and v-p of Sporty's Pilot Shop's catalog division, recently wrote about how new pilots are immune to the debate about whether pilots should use mobile devices in the cockpit because they began their aviation endeavors wedded to mobile devices and can’t conceive not using them while flying.

Since the iPad was introduced in 2010, it and the Android devices and Microsoft Windows-based Surface tablets that followed have transformed the computing experience. While the Surface tablet has made few inroads into aviation (except for a few airlines that use them as electronic flight bags), Android and Apple devices are hugely popular among pilots and support dozens of apps with amazing capabilities, from full-fledged EFBs and GPS navigators with synthetic vision to utilities that eliminate complex calculations for weight-and-balance and other aerial number crunchings.

I well recall my first experience with ForeFlight. I had to borrow my kid’s iPod—this was before the iPad was introduced—and then once I got ForeFlight installed and running, I couldn’t figure out how to zoom in and out when looking at a sectional chart. I sent a message to ForeFlight and got an instant response explaining the pinch-zoom gesture, and then I was hooked.

When the iPad came out and our company bought one for every employee to encourage us to explore this new technology, I immediately saw the amazing benefits this device offered. Finally, a computing device with a simple touchscreen interface, easy to buy and update applications, and fantastic reliability. This was so much better than the kludgy efforts I’d seen to date, mostly involving trying to turn a Windows laptop into an EFB.

Of course the iPad didn’t precede aviation app developers. Companies such as Hilton Software, Control Vision and others were pioneers in turning handheld PCs and BlackBerrys into EFB-like devices, and ForeFlight’s developers couldn’t have known the iPad was imminent when they came up with their iPhone app in 2007. Nevertheless, since the iPhone and iPad were introduced, as well as Android-powered devices, the pace of development in the aviation app field has accelerated remarkably.

Now EFB/navigation apps routinely include sophisticated synthetic vision displays powered by external AHRS devices costing less than $1,000. Corporate pilots are routinely consulting FAA-approved performance information provided in apps from their aircraft manufacturers or independent developers such as APG, Cavu, Gyronimo and many others. There is even an appXavionthat will display a flight path and guidance to the nearest runway after an engine failure. Honeywell’s GoDirect Flight Preview app lets pilots “fly” through an approach on their iPads beforehand, to better prepare for an upcoming approach. And more manufacturers are allowing apps to connect to onboard avionics, for flight plan creation and sharing, frequency selection and other useful functions.

The devices that all these apps run on keep getting better and better, thanks to the rapid advancement of technology. If progress continues at this pace, it won’t be long before pilots will never have to look down at the between-seats console and pluck away at an FMS keyboard but just reach for the tablet’s touchscreen to quickly set up or alter a flight plan.