Comment Re:Melodrama (Score 1) 60
Exactly. This is a remote visual inspection that maneuvers a tool to a difficult-to-access area and feeds images back to to a qualified inspector. The trick is ensuring the quality of the images, which should not be hard with adequate standards.
Similar systems are used for inspecting the insides of nuclear reactor vessels. Since the dose would kill any inspector that got inside the vessel, underwater cameras and/or miniature submersible robots are used. Before the inspection, they will hold a calibration standard with a variety of colors and scratch sizes in front of the camera to ensure that it can see the types of defects that being looked for. Before the camera is removed from the water, the standard is filmed once again to ensure that the camera quality did not degrade during the inspection. This is controlled by the ASME Boiler and Pressure Code, which we are bound to by regulations. A similar set of standards and quality assurance could be applied to camera inspections of aviation in order to reap the time/manpower benefits without reducing the ability to find dangerous defects.