Alaska Airlines is now using generative AI to turn natural language prompts like “I want a festive Christmas vacation somewhere not too crowded” into fully realized itineraries, the airline’s director of innovation announced Wednesday in Pittsburgh.
“We're the first airline to launch natural language search,” Bernadette Berger said to a room full of transportation leaders gathered at the Heinz History Center for the city’s second annual aviation and robotics summit.
The three-day event is structured to brainstorm solutions that can modernize the future of travel. Last year’s problem-solving sessions included ideas like self-driving wheel chocks to keep planes from rolling away, and helped spark a new Pittsburgh startup, Journey Robotics.
“We're bringing people in to say: ‘Help us think about what your product can do … for not just us, but an entire industry,” said Christina Cassotis, CEO of Allegheny County Airport Authority, which oversees Pittsburgh International Airport.
The authority plans to choose one prototype that can go to market and fund the idea with up to $75,000, in partnership with the Henry L. Hillman Foundation.
“We're going to take one of these ideas, and we're gonna put our money where our mouth is,” Ms. Cassotis said.
She highlighted two innovations already underway at the airport: on-site energy creation and on-site fuel production, through a potential partnership with CNX Resources announced this week.
“We really intend to be the first airport to produce sustainable aviation fuel on site and then barge it up to some other airports who might need it,” Ms. Cassotis said.
She also gave a shoutout to Cole Wolfson, who leads the authority’s xBridge program to engage startups in the region.
Dozens of airlines and airport executives, from Washington to Phoenix, and Alaska to the United Kingdom, will participate in the workshops this week. Andrew Masich, CEO of the Heinz History Center, wanted to make sure they understood the setting for those conversations.
“The history of flight has a connection to Pittsburgh,” he said. “We all know the Wright brothers got off the ground at Kitty Hawk” — but that inaugural ride wouldn’t have been possible without a lighter engine block manufactured by the Aluminum Company of America, or Alcoa, which is still based in Pittsburgh.
In space travel, too, the Steel City played a role.
“Neil Armstrong, the commander of Apollo 11 that launched in 1969 to go to the moon — he was launched in a rocket built by a Pittsburgh company, North American Rockwell. A Saturn V rocket — no one had ever seen anything like that before.” Mr. Masich said.
The glass in the Columbia capsule? Made by PPG. “Pittsburgh plated glass they called it in 1969,” he said.
The live motion pictures of Armstrong's first steps on the moon? Brought to you by Westinghouse.
Given that history, “it's altogether fitting and proper,” that the aviation and robotics summit has found a home in Pittsburgh, Mr. Masich said.
Evan Robinson-Johnson: ejohnson@post-gazette.com and @sightsonwheels
First Published: May 15, 2024, 6:45 p.m.
