October 24th, 2011
We covered this when iOS 5 first came out, but now the press is starting to pick up the story. Flying magazine has published an iPad Pilot Safety Alert article here. From the article:
“The release by Apple of a new operating system for the iPad, iOS 5, has raised concerns among aviation app providers that pilots’ iPads might lose charts or even entire applications without the user’s knowledge.
The issue has to do with Apple’s decision to let the new operating system delete files at its discretion if it were to run low on space. In a worst-case scenario, a pilot might add a video or download a new app only to have the new operating system delete charts from the application database. When the pilot tried to pull up the chart to fly an approach, it would simply not be there.”
Hopefully Apple will address the issue soon.