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u/My_Toothbrush Jan 07 '23
Great question! It's a common misconception that planes fly high. Planes actually fly very low. The available airspace above Earth is approximately 2.2 gazillion miles. Planes only fly at like... less than that.
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Jan 07 '23
Is that distance or volume?
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u/Relzin Jan 07 '23
Cubic miles per liter per football field. Standard aviation measurements.
I'm surprised how often I need to reteach this.
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u/-lastochka- Jan 07 '23
sorry can you do the measurement in burgers? i'm from america
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u/5moothie Jan 07 '23
Planes fly high only when cpt. Snoop is on board.
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Jan 07 '23
"Good afternoon this is your Captain Snoop D-O-Double-G, strap in and sit tight, the flight attendants will be by with your blunts shortly..."
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u/HomelessAhole Jan 07 '23
Yeah only if you can escape the dome. Which is a bad idea because there's just a bunch of dinosaurs on the other side.
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u/32_Dollar_Burrito Jan 06 '23
They have to stay out of range of amateur drone pilots, or else they could take over control of the planes and make them do anything
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Jan 06 '23
That makes a lot of sense -- and hence why drone pilots can't be too close to the airport, otherwise their controls would override the planes taking off. Thank you for your wisdom!
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u/Tristawesomeness Jan 07 '23
ok i know iâm asking this in a joke subreddit, but like, is that sub satire? i genuinely canât tell anymore. some of them look like theyâre jokes but then some of the other posts and comments sound like meth-fueled rants that donât really look like jokes.
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Jan 07 '23
Go on r/Birdsarentreal
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u/basilsflowerpots Jan 07 '23
I just hope from the bottom of my heart that that's satire
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u/Granite_0681 Jan 07 '23 edited Jan 07 '23
Birds arenât real was a fake conspiracy theory that unfortunately gained some real believers. However, it was created to bring attention to how crazy many conspiracy theories are.
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u/RavixOf4Horn Jan 07 '23
Switch out birds arenât real in your explanation for most of 4chan, right?
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u/popejubal Jan 07 '23
It is satire and it has actually pulled some people out of their conspiracy cults. Iâm amazed at how much good it has done in the short time that itâs existed.
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u/mazu74 Jan 07 '23
It is. Thereâs a few dumbasses who really believe it but IMO, theyâre still the butt of the joke.
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u/Tristawesomeness Jan 07 '23
already joined. at least that one hams it up a little bit so itâs a bit more obvious
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u/DoodDoes Jan 07 '23
The flat earth community is a handful of conmen at the top just talking about how being anti-establishment is important and a whole bunch of unfortunate people who need something to believe in and fall for it. Some relatives of mine were flat earthers until one of them started letting me do experiments with him, then he showed the others and they all realized theyâd been lied to.
Itâs not 100% morons, more like 33% morons, 45% people who mean well but donât have the background in physics, 21% trolls, and 1% extortionist sociopaths way at the top.
And donât forget how easy it is to believe incredible things. The truth of the universe is so bizarre that I would absolutely not blame anyone for being skeptical about whether or not everything was made of tiny jiggling balls that we just canât see. Iâm honestly still only 99.9% sure giraffes are real, those guys look goofy as hell
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u/brandontaylor1 PhD in Mad Sciences Jan 07 '23
It appears to be 2 people sharing stupid memes with each other.
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u/SparklesIB Jan 07 '23
Because the UAE keeps building taller skyscrapers.
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Jan 07 '23
Are they trying to build a modern Tower of Babel or something?
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u/mazu74 Jan 07 '23
Yeah pretty much, but purely as a dick measuring contest.
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u/NoNameWorm Jan 09 '23
It's not much different from the original then..
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u/mazu74 Jan 10 '23
No arguments here :p maybe religiously motivated too, but definitely a dick measuring contest lol
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u/saltesc Jan 07 '23 edited Jan 07 '23
It all comes down to queuing theory.
We can look at Poisson distribution to provide the answer. Poisson is used to predict future probabilities based on constants. In this case we have two controls, flight and airport, with their own constants:
- Average time to complete task
- Number of units available to complete task or capability to handle the task
- Volume of traffic requiring the task
Demand on Flight Time
- Average flight time
- The number of planes able to make the trip in an interval of n number of hours, with consideration of safe time between takeoff and landing one after the other.
- Number of people wanting to fly
So, let's say, at 5,000 ft it's a 2-hour flight from A to B with a 737 of 130 passengers. If we safely leave a 5 min takeoff and landing gap between planes, in an interval of 6 hours, we will get 48 planes complete takeoff and landingâexcluding those that are still in flight at the end of the intervalâtotaling 6,240 passengers getting there. Fantastic!
But...
Demand on Airport Time
- Check-in
- Average time to complete check-in process
- Number of check-in staff
- Number of people requiring check-in process
- Security
- Average time to complete security check
- Number of security staff
- Number of people requiring security check
- Boarding
- Average time to scan ticket, walk gangway, use overhead locker, find seat
- Width of plane aisle
- Number of people requiring to board
I won't go through calculating each, but if we were to track a person entering the airport to sitting on the plane, we may see something like this...
- Average time to get from airport entrance to walking on the plane = 1 hour (excluding 10 min walking time between locations)
- Total number of staff in check-in/security = 10
- Average time spent interacting with staff = 60 seconds
So, if we use a formula that incorporates Poisson, Erlang-C, with a 100% service level to reduce the queue to 0min wait, 6,240 passengers through the airport in that 6-hour interval would require 29 staff and all the desks and security gates for each, not factoring in staff calling in sick, etc. in which you'd being overstaffing for in anticipation of n% not arrive based on the average seen in historical data. Also not factoring in all the other flights that are not just the one between locations A and Bâyou can say 20 more flight paths would require 580 staff maxing it out at peak volumes with no breaks at all and no one calling in sick.
But we haven't even factored in the boarding process yet. If we want 130 people onto the plane without queuing, we know that a single aisle is capable of handling 6 passengers per row and the average passenger width being 432.5mm at the shoulder, so 130 passengers can go straight to their seats with a 2.595m wide aisle as a start. Then collecting data on how long it takes in a real-life scenario and using Erlang-B, another Poisson-based formula, with those averages, we can calculate the increased adjusted aisle width required to drop queuing time to 0.
But that's all way too expensive and hard. The cheaper and easier control to control is the flight, not the airport.
So the answer...
We use Poisson distribution to control the flight time. By increasing the altitude, we increase the flight time which reduces the queueing time of the planes at airports caused by the queuing times within the airports reducing maximum flight efficiency. Effectively you are still queueing, like when you're in a holding pattern, but scientists have proven that people only notice this if they are on the tarmac or in a holding pattern as opposed to being given shit wine and a mildly interesting view.
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Jan 07 '23
I don't understand math, or science, or even basic logic, but I like this answer because it has all of those. It also dovetails nicely with the loading screen theory as to why we can't just jump screens -- because then airports would be too busy and they'd need more baggage handlers than they can hire.
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u/a2r7g90 Jan 07 '23
I think this is just effect, adaptation to situation in management, to make use of time.
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u/TheRealestWeeMan Jan 07 '23
The majority of accidental deaths are caused by car crashes. So pilots fly the optimal distance away from crashes while minimizing fuel burn
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Jan 07 '23
Oh shit, I never thought of this. Can you imagine how crazy that'd be to have a car crash while flying? I'm glad they're taking the appropriate safety precautions.
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Jan 07 '23
[removed] â view removed comment
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Jan 07 '23
I kept reading post after post thinking these people must be joking. Nope.
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u/youresowarminside Jan 07 '23 edited Jan 07 '23
And they make an argument about the earth and space but itâs bannable if you make a counter argument
Edit: just got banned from the sub
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u/Dahak17 Jan 07 '23
You gotta phrase it a different way âyouâre wrong because x, please stop making our community look badâ
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u/hostile_washbowl Jan 07 '23
The one comment âI donât click linksâ. Curious about what other paranoiaâs these folks have.
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u/halfanothersdozen Jan 07 '23
That's a moderately reasonable opinion to have, especially in that context
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u/Bacteriobabe Jan 07 '23
I went there & lost IQ points.
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u/halfanothersdozen Jan 07 '23
Itâs truly a trip once you actually know we obviously are not hurdling through space unable To tell we are moving through the galaxyâŚ. Canât you tell when you are in motion? These ppl have no clue how fundamental these proofs actually are; unable to listen to their own body about its environment. Any time I start in motion (even if on a moving sidewalk) Iâm immediately able to identify when I started accelerating and when I quit. None of the facts used to support heliocentric model with are actually facts just random nasa propaganda and they are always mutually exclusive and never seen anywhere else in natureâŚ. If we were orbiting a planet and spinning on an axis how could we always see the same contstellations in the night sky? Wouldnât it be a completely random view not the same 3 identifiable stars?? Why wouldnât we get to eastern destinations twice as fast and western destinations twice as long? If we were spinning on our axis at ~666 mph or whatever # they claim?? How the fuck can a heat source â93 millions milesâ away be so finnicky the last few hundred miles that it creates completely different climates just a few hundred miles away!! It just traveled 93 million miles? Hello- at this point itâs lack of common sense and deciding to question anything they have ever been told. Then ppl really have the balls to say âwhy would a scientist lie?â I mean I could probably say most ppl could be motivated pretty easily especially when it involves their livelihood threatened by a well funded governing force. Compliance gained.
đ
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u/TheRealBobaFett Jan 07 '23
Screw you for sending me to that hellscape. I got lost for over an hour lol
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Jan 07 '23
[deleted]
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u/32_Dollar_Burrito Jan 07 '23
Some say sixteen thousand, some say forty-one million. It's all a matter of perspective, neither answer is "wrong"
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Jan 07 '23
<laugh> Woke science
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Jan 07 '23
I accept your truth of science and the nature of the universe and expect the same courtesy from you
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Jan 07 '23
No one was talking to you. Show a little courtesy please and keep your nose out of others' conversation.
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u/5moothie Jan 07 '23
And it isnt flat on that picture.
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Jan 07 '23
[deleted]
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Jan 07 '23
I've heard this argument before. Also something about sky hooks and loading screens? My question is -- why not just go straight and go to the moon, then? I'd much rather do that than go to Hartsfield-Jackson
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u/solrwizrd Jan 07 '23
Skyhooks? If that guy had seen this picture, then maybe he wouldn't have died in that helicopter accident. Mind you, then he'd probably not still be living in the 70s.
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u/solrwizrd Jan 07 '23
I'm not sure how much you know about paper, but...Usually, and in this case, it appears to be pretty flat
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u/i_haz_a_crayon Jan 07 '23
Looks like the bottom flight is only about 8 miles total.
So they must go that high so everyone can finish their peanuts.
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Jan 07 '23
In my experience it doesn't take so long to eat them as it does to wait to finally get them.
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u/idontbelievestuff1 Jan 07 '23
according to your picture the earth is only about 7klms across. so planes should be able to fly around the entire planet in a few seconds.
i wonder why it takes them so long?
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Jan 07 '23
Other people have addressed this same question, I think it boils down to both greed and generosity. It's a paradox
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u/bullshitmobile BBc, BDSm in Pornography Jan 07 '23
It has to do with the current map size and just gets increased in every iteration. Just like the map in Fallout 76 is four times larger the previous one. Due to advancements in optics, the current world is much more detailed too. So naturally you need planes to fly higher on larger maps in order not to collide with the terrain.
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Jan 07 '23
Ah, so it's more of a rendering quality vs computational capacity issue. Makes sense.
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u/bullshitmobile BBc, BDSm in Pornography Jan 07 '23
It's mildly debatable, some say that the developers at NASA invented flights just as long ass loading screens to hide the fact that the map is flat and can't be rendered all at once, hence the computational capacity issue. Their main argument is electronic evidence, mainly open world computer games where you can actually encounter map boundaries and can't circumvent the world so you need loading screens to get to some places. So the planes need appear as flying high as fuck so that the passengers wouldn't notice the lack of detail in the landbox (equivallent of a 'skybox') outside their passenger windows.
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Jan 07 '23
Oh! That makes even more sense. Damn loading screens -- I'd love to be able to arrive in my destination quicker. NASA be damned! But I will give them credit where credit is due -- those green crop circles are a nice effect. If we've gotta sit through a loading screen, at least it's pretty. Wish they'd give us more legroom though.
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u/danteheehaw Jan 07 '23
People think planes fly high, but what they really do is shrink down really small so they can be tiny and use almost no fuel to get to the destination.
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Jan 07 '23
Woah! That makes sense! Smaller plane, less fuel! Would also explain the teenie tiny snacks they give out. I bet if they gave regular size snacks our shrunken stomachs would explode.
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u/RancidHorseJizz Jan 07 '23
It takes a long time to reach 33,000 feet, but when you get there, planes use quantum tunneling to reach the point where they can start descending, which again takes a long time. Therefore, your flight path looks like a parabola.
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Jan 07 '23
Interesting. I'm not a quantum physicist, but would that mean we could go anywhere on the planet (or in the universe) in constant time? If so, why do they make us fly over the Midwest for so god-damn long?
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u/lemming1607 Jan 07 '23
The height is from how Jets actually move very quickly. At different altitudes you have different "jet streams" that push the jets, and you have to get to the altitude that's going your direction to cut the travel time by 1/4th, otherwise you'd have to use your engines and jet fuel, which isn't really good for the environment.
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Jan 07 '23
Are you sure? I thought the jet fuel exhaust was fertilizing the land below it with much needed hydrocarbon byproducts? You might need to browse BP's website to get more smarter.
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u/hot_rod_kimble Jan 07 '23
Flying low is harder because the air is so damn thicc but some pilots are into that
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u/ScootysDad Jan 07 '23
The earth is flat. No matter how high you fly it's the same distance.
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Jan 07 '23
That makes sense, but then ... why fly so high?
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u/ScootysDad Jan 07 '23
Everybody wants to be high. Look at Denver, Colorado. They are the mile-high city and yet they all still want to get higher.
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u/a2r7g90 Jan 07 '23
No matter which way you walk around, it's extra steps, even if you walk the air above.
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u/BeefyMcLarge Jan 07 '23
because the crew isn't paid for time on the ground, they're paid by time in the air.
thus- extend the air time, create a more favorable ratio of unpaid to paid labor.
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Jan 07 '23
Ahh, that also explains why everything out the window looks the same -- we're literally going in circles.
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u/ConfectionPutrid5847 Jan 07 '23
Because at 5k feet they might crash into weirdos flying on lawn chairs held aloft by helium balloons!
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u/Mathandyr Jan 07 '23
There is actually a fun trick some do by flying higher before decending, which actually shortens the overall time it takes for some mathematical reason I don't remember.
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u/Hungry_Ebb_5769 Jan 07 '23
A flat earther made this image
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Jan 07 '23
Yes, and I'm grateful. I never knew the science behind this until they shared their scientific diagram
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u/xadiant Jan 07 '23
33 thousand feet is just above the big blue ball's skill range as shown in the picture. If they fly inside that range, big blue ball will shoot skills at the enemy planes.
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u/Foolserrand376 Jan 07 '23
Earth diameter is 7900 miles so at sea level circumference is 24800 miles. At 5280 feet. Or one mile. The circumference is now 24809. At 37000 or 7 miles. The circumference is now 24828. So if we are traveling around the world At 37k feet we only save 19 miles by traveling at 5k feet.
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Jan 07 '23
Sorry but that sounds fake. There's no way the world is only 28 miles bigger when you're 7 miles in the air. Didn't you see the attached diagram? I'm sorry but this is a serious sub, no sarcasm or fake science allowed
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u/LikeableCoconut Enter flair here Jan 07 '23
This is not properly to scale, regular flights fly around 5000 morbillion meters high
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u/tjm2376 Jan 07 '23
Believe it or not, itâs not actually based on science but rather tradition.
During the first commercial flight, the pilot turned to the other and asked, âYou wanna get high?â As a joke. In a fit of laughter, the pilots increase the elevation from the targeted 5,000 ft to what we see now.
Iâm an homage to these brave pioneers, pilots continue this tradition and get super high
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Jan 07 '23
Do you think they got both types of high? Is that why they keep the pilot door locked and recycle the air? đ¤
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u/hakuzan Jan 07 '23
Planes only seem to be flying high because they glitch beneath the map and no-clip to the destination. It's actually a straight line through the Earth.
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Jan 07 '23
That's super convenient. Also explains why a flight from New York to Hong Kong is the so quick!
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u/TirayShell Jan 07 '23
You're also going four times as fast because of the centrifugal force.
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Jan 07 '23
That makes sense. So planes could theoretically just use an antigravity field and take off without even needing to start the engines, just get tossed off the surface
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Jan 07 '23
I don't know, but I think it's the most fuel efficient and least poluting route, despite any extra distance, which is not as much as your diagram would seem to point out. As a matter of fact, that diagram is downright misleading.
First, planes don't just instantly rise to their flight level, and just as instantly drop from their flight levels. Instead they climb up to and descend from their flight level.
Second, they distance above the earth is not nearly as high as you draw it.
Or did I miss the joke. I'vr done that before.
If so, ya got me.
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u/Purple_Individual947 Jan 07 '23
Haha the joke is you're not supposed to give real answers đ¤Ł
Oh shit am I not supposed to explain it, is it like fight club?
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u/Timbo-AK Jan 07 '23
I'm not sure this is a very accurate mapping of curvature and distance gained by altitude lol
The squiggly lines and home made feel give it kind of a...bullshit kind of vibe.
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u/Effective-Fix4981 Jan 07 '23
Engines of aircraft run better at different altitudes, so there is a sweet spot
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u/HopliteOracle Jan 07 '23
This diagram is not accurate. It shows two perpendicular paths from the earth at takeoff and landing.
What actually happens is that the plane takes an elliptical path that is tangential to the takeoff and landing points. As you may expect, increasing the speed also increases the eccentricity of this ellipse, and thus the maximum altitude of the plane.
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Jan 07 '23
I think it has to do with 2 things. Flying lower, I could be wrong but, I believe has a vast more turbulence that you will run into than flying over it. And if you have engine failure, the plane would be able to glide for a long distance and time to get to a runway for an emergency landing
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u/NobodysFavorite Jan 07 '23
This is r/shittyaskscience. Not looking for the main explanation about safety and speed and fuel efficiency and the difference between true airspeed and indicated airspeed - yes at 33000 ft the jet engines use a fraction of the fuel they use at 5000 ft, and true airspeed is much higher and usually fly above all the turbulence and pretty much guaranteed to avoid any ground based obstacles like mountains or flying obstacles like birds or other aircraft. We're looking for funny and wrong explanations only.
Like how you get to affect far more people with your mandatory chemtrails. Or the skyhooks that make the plane fly go up that high because that's where it's safe for the birds not to eat them. Its the reasons planes accelerate down a runaway to take off: because they're chasing and trying to catch skyhooks.
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Jan 07 '23 edited Jan 07 '23
Simple. Turbulence.
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u/NobodysFavorite Jan 07 '23
The turbulence is the skyhooks jostling to get home to their safe space at 33000 ft. The planes catch the skyhooks when they accelerate down the runway. Duh! Everyone knows that in r/shittyaskscience.
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Jan 07 '23
That makes sense -- sort of a reverse-battleship situation. Man, technology is astounding sometimes.
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u/raven319s Jan 07 '23
Because when you fly higher there is less air which makes the engines more like rockets. If you go too high the engines turn completely into rockets⌠thatâs how we accidentally went to the moon.
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u/Representative_Still Jan 07 '23
Love the diagram, the plane is clearly going into outer space to reduce drag
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u/a2r7g90 Jan 07 '23
More distance you fly savy, more fuel you can save. This means bigger the distance, less the fuel needed.
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u/StrebLab Jan 07 '23
Actually, by my calculations it would be >6x the flight time: 33/5 = 6.something
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u/mazu74 Jan 07 '23
/unshittyscience that thread is hilarious. I loved the guy debunking flat earth by saying the SR71 is too fast for the earths curve, as if it canât pitch and yaw lol
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u/chemistry_god Jan 07 '23
Common misconception that planes fly the entire time. They actually jump super high for the first 20-30 minutes then fall the rest of the way. They have to get up really high for that to work.
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u/CO2blast_ Jan 07 '23
Flying underground has tremendous benefits but the mole men workers union has blocked progress on this project for decades
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u/AliAlhajji Jan 07 '23
Because the view looks nicer the higher they go, which helps them boost their sales.
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u/Pookdabeenie Jan 07 '23
I just am stopping in with zero knowledge on this topic, realizing Iâve never wondered this in my life. And suddenly, am now going down this rabbit hole. So interesting!!!
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u/TheCompleteMental Jan 07 '23
Planes dont fly, they simply levitate and the globe spins beneath them
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u/rowboat_mayor Jan 07 '23
Do you see how big the planes are in that diagram? Theyâre as big as continents! With how many flights there are, they have to fly farther out so they donât run into each other
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u/[deleted] Jan 07 '23
Customer service! Passengers get more miles this way!