Landing is fully automated on passanger aircrafts?

Last time we were flying with colleagues we had a disagreement: they all said that landing of the airplane (Boeings and Airbuses) is fully automated.

But I remember once reading that the very end of landing is manually finished by the pilot, because it is too complex to automate it.



Does someone can confirm (would be nice if a pilot) who is controlling the airplane during the landing?



Thanks
Some aircraft can do Cat III auto lands which will allow the aircraft to fly the aircraft onto the runway (depending on the catagory).

That being said, even if that is an option most pilots (ceilings and visibility permitting) will still hand fly the aircraft to the ground.

On many commercial aircraft which are only certified for Cat I approaches, the lowest they could go would be 200ft and 1/2sm. From my experience, usually once established on final and by about 1000ft AGL (above ground level) most crews seem to hand fly the aircraft.
Interesting and reassuring to know that pilots prefer to land manually than rely on computers.

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Interesting to note that it was possible, well before 9/11, to fly planes by remote. Particularly passenger jets. This technology has actually been around for years and would make it possible to force a plane into a hi-gee turn that human pilots could not perform.



Draw your own conclusions.

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Some planes CAN land themselves, with proper support from ground based technology. In actual practice, takeoff and landing are the LEAST automated portions of any flight.

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Just to add, in Amsterdam it is a requirement that commercial planes are landed by full computer control. This can be disconcerting - last I heard the system is full digital without modulating, this means that engines are either fully on or fully off.

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the closest out there is guiding an aircraft to a runway. however for the actually landing its all human control. technology is advantased but not enough to take away the job of a pilot.

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I had the opertunity to ride the observers seat on a flight into Sao Palo some time ago. I sat there and watched the aircraft fly its self right to the runway. The pilot took over when the wheels were on the ground and taxied us top the gate.
most of the time we disconnect the autopilot and land it manually due to a number of factors but modern aircraft are fully capable of landing automatically and actually have to do it at least once in 28days to keep the aircraft autoland current.
We rarely use auto pilot since it is not very advanced

Every 150 flying hours we use the system

If the runway is very broad and completely clear auto pilot will not hurt



This website may help in the future: http://www.aviationearth.com/
Under normal circumstances Autoland isn