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As someone who has lived through some of the strongest hurricanes in recorded history you are wrong on multiple counts. Flying through the storm and the wall ey

by yardie 9y ago

As someone who has lived through some of the strongest hurricanes in recorded history you are wrong on multiple counts. Flying through the storm and the wall eye is dangerous and NOAA has lost planes to it. One of their hardened P3 had equipment and life raft ripped from their anchors [0]. There is definitely lightning and waterspouts during a hurricane. That is not reserved for thunderstorms. This was a flight to evacuate crew who are stationed in PR. Non-rev refers to crew who are commuting or on holiday. On a typical flight a plane may turn over in a few hours but the crew may remain for 24 hours and leave the following flight. This crew was down route and needed to head back to their operating base. [0] https://www.wunderground.com/resources/education/hugo8.asp https://www.wunderground.com/resources/education/hugo8.asp

SeoxyS 9y ago
Non-rev refers to any non-revenue passengers. You're conflating NRSA (non revenue space available) with non-rev generally. There's also NRPS (non revenue positive space) and "must ride" flyers in that category. This flight was picking up airline personnel, not revenue passengers. Your having lived through hurricanes on the ground is entirely irrelevant to a discussion about the safety of overflying the hurricane. At the flight altitudes of a commercial jet none of the effects you mention happen. You need to plan your path carefully for the descent, landing, and takeoff. But at cruising altitude, hurricane winds are not a major safety concern.
- yardie 9y ago
  > flying at cruising altitude or even through the storm is fairly harmless, Yes, so harmless that no one does it. NOAA has to use an extremely reinforced, highly maintained fleet of P3 Orions. You've mentioned repeatedly in your parent posts that hurricanes are harmless to planes when commercial pilots in this forum say they wouldn't do it without excellent weather planning. > You need to plan your path carefully for the descent, landing, and takeoff. But at cruising altitude, hurricane winds are not a major safety concern. Planes have all sorts of cruising envelopes. Gulfstreams are in the 40k feet. Commercial jets cruise at 25-35K foot band. And commercial turboprops (commuter shuttles) are in the 10-20k foot band. While the first 2 won't feel the gale force winds they can experience the updrafts as turbulence. Commercial jets fly in the lower stratum of the stratosphere. There is still weather phenomena at the height, just much less than the troposphere. Finally, the captain will avoid a hurricane even if it doesn't really affect them. They may need to decend to a lower attitude for an engine flameout, for example. And why deal with the added complication of emergency landing during a hurricane.
  - SeoxyS 9y ago
    There are plenty of ancillary reasons to avoid overflying hurricanes when possible—such as passenger comfort, to avoid possible turbulence; or if it disables nearby diversion points in case of an issue inflight. But people here are making wild claims that overflying hurricanes is inherently dangerous and puts lives at risk. That's factually incorrect and is what I came here to correct. You (and others) are making examples about the NOAA's Orions (which are reinforced to fly through, not over hurricanes, flying into the wildest parts on purpose), and or other turboprops which fly 10-20k ft. That's not what we're talking about here… we're talking about commercial jet aircraft which fly at 30-40k ft. Business jets fly even higher, sometimes up to 52,000ft. Just this week, I flew private in a Citation X at 49,000ft.
    - blorsh 9y ago
      Hurricanes reach to 60,000 feet.
Axsuul 9y ago
It appears from this Quora question[0] that it it is, in fact, not dangerous to fly OVER a hurricane. The keyword is over. [0] https://www.quora.com/Is-it-dangerous-to-fly-over-a-hurricane-in-a-commercial-airliner-at-cruising-altitude https://www.quora.com/Is-it-dangerous-to-fly-over-a-hurrican...

by yardie 9y ago

SeoxyS 9y ago

Non-rev refers to any non-revenue passengers. You're conflating NRSA (non revenue space available) with non-rev generally. There's also NRPS (non revenue positive space) and "must ride" flyers in that category. This flight was picking up airline personnel, not revenue passengers. Your having lived through hurricanes on the ground is entirely irrelevant to a discussion about the safety of overflying the hurricane. At the flight altitudes of a commercial jet none of the effects you mention happen. You need to plan your path carefully for the descent, landing, and takeoff. But at cruising altitude, hurricane winds are not a major safety concern.

yardie 9y ago
> flying at cruising altitude or even through the storm is fairly harmless, Yes, so harmless that no one does it. NOAA has to use an extremely reinforced, highly maintained fleet of P3 Orions. You've mentioned repeatedly in your parent posts that hurricanes are harmless to planes when commercial pilots in this forum say they wouldn't do it without excellent weather planning. > You need to plan your path carefully for the descent, landing, and takeoff. But at cruising altitude, hurricane winds are not a major safety concern. Planes have all sorts of cruising envelopes. Gulfstreams are in the 40k feet. Commercial jets cruise at 25-35K foot band. And commercial turboprops (commuter shuttles) are in the 10-20k foot band. While the first 2 won't feel the gale force winds they can experience the updrafts as turbulence. Commercial jets fly in the lower stratum of the stratosphere. There is still weather phenomena at the height, just much less than the troposphere. Finally, the captain will avoid a hurricane even if it doesn't really affect them. They may need to decend to a lower attitude for an engine flameout, for example. And why deal with the added complication of emergency landing during a hurricane.
- SeoxyS 9y ago
  There are plenty of ancillary reasons to avoid overflying hurricanes when possible—such as passenger comfort, to avoid possible turbulence; or if it disables nearby diversion points in case of an issue inflight. But people here are making wild claims that overflying hurricanes is inherently dangerous and puts lives at risk. That's factually incorrect and is what I came here to correct. You (and others) are making examples about the NOAA's Orions (which are reinforced to fly through, not over hurricanes, flying into the wildest parts on purpose), and or other turboprops which fly 10-20k ft. That's not what we're talking about here… we're talking about commercial jet aircraft which fly at 30-40k ft. Business jets fly even higher, sometimes up to 52,000ft. Just this week, I flew private in a Citation X at 49,000ft.
  - blorsh 9y ago
    Hurricanes reach to 60,000 feet.

Axsuul 9y ago

It appears from this Quora question[0] that it it is, in fact, not dangerous to fly OVER a hurricane. The keyword is over. [0] https://www.quora.com/Is-it-dangerous-to-fly-over-a-hurricane-in-a-commercial-airliner-at-cruising-altitude https://www.quora.com/Is-it-dangerous-to-fly-over-a-hurrican...