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I can't help but wonder how they went to the bathroom? Did they have a little cassette toilet in the back that they had to dump out every couple days? Having f

I can't help but wonder how they went to the bathroom? Did they have a little cassette toilet in the back that they had to dump out every couple days? Having flown a 172 for a couple hours I can't imagine wanting to live in one for two months. I'd go insane.

miketery 8y ago
Precisely, those things are tiny! Its smaller and less comfortable than a car - so imagine the point which you get tiered driving a long distance, now cut by two - that's likely when you'll start to get fatigued in a small plane like a 172.
mikestew 8y ago
Given the creative, but somewhat low-rent solutions they devised, I’m guessing that the bathroom solution wasn’t nearly as fancy as a space-consuming cassette toilet. I’m going with “bucket” and “go fly over some uninhabited desert for a minute”.
TallGuyShort 8y ago
I think most military folks could tell you what happens when someone tries to pee off the back of a truck when it's moving at a pretty moderate speed. I'd hate to picture dumping a cassette toilet's tank at 2-3 times that speed :)
- deleted 8y ago
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Kagerjay 8y ago
Probably the same thing that long distance truck drivers do. Pee in a bottle Poop in a bucket
- marvin 8y ago
  Glider pilots use a small plastic bag or a bottle for the former, so I think this is the pragmatic, non-technological solution that was actually used.
NeedMoreTea 8y ago
Considering they rigged up some Heath Robinson outside step for bathing, I figure they opened the door and went "over the edge". I've also been in a 172, there's about as much room as an old Mini. Two months would be torture.
cmurf 8y ago
Pee tube through the airframe, I assume because I've flown in a Cessna 182 so equipped. Pooping, pack it out in your MRE bags.
- escherplex 8y ago
  Min KIAS, moderate flaps on a 172 I believe is 50kts (93km/h) and they could easily "recycle" their MRE bags during refueling runs paralleling deserted highways (with subsequent collection presumably by 'this road maintained by local Lions Club chapter' personnel -joke- ) Isn't it odd that the comment with the most additional comments in this post involves bathroom activities?
cyberferret 8y ago
From another article posted above: > This also inevitably leads one to the question: how did they use the bathroom? Well, because the Cessna 172 doesn’t come standard with a toilet, and there was no room to install a permanent one, Timm and Cook had to rig their own system. This took the form of a folding camp toilet and plastic bags. Once they had been used, the plastic bags were then disposed of over unpopulated areas in the desert around Blythe. According to Mark Hall-Patton, the administrator of the Clark County Museum system in Las Vegas, “I once asked John’s widow if they handed down the waste during refueling runs. She said, ‘No. That’s why it’s so green around Blythe.’ ”
- cf498 8y ago
  Steep face rock climbing has the same problem. If you climb for days on a vertical cliff, there is really just one directs where all the waste has to go. Better watch out that it doesnt hit your rope or some climber below you.

miketery 8y ago

Precisely, those things are tiny! Its smaller and less comfortable than a car - so imagine the point which you get tiered driving a long distance, now cut by two - that's likely when you'll start to get fatigued in a small plane like a 172.

mikestew 8y ago

Given the creative, but somewhat low-rent solutions they devised, I’m guessing that the bathroom solution wasn’t nearly as fancy as a space-consuming cassette toilet. I’m going with “bucket” and “go fly over some uninhabited desert for a minute”.

TallGuyShort 8y ago

I think most military folks could tell you what happens when someone tries to pee off the back of a truck when it's moving at a pretty moderate speed. I'd hate to picture dumping a cassette toilet's tank at 2-3 times that speed :)

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

Kagerjay 8y ago

Probably the same thing that long distance truck drivers do. Pee in a bottle Poop in a bucket

marvin 8y ago
Glider pilots use a small plastic bag or a bottle for the former, so I think this is the pragmatic, non-technological solution that was actually used.

NeedMoreTea 8y ago

Considering they rigged up some Heath Robinson outside step for bathing, I figure they opened the door and went "over the edge". I've also been in a 172, there's about as much room as an old Mini. Two months would be torture.

cmurf 8y ago

Pee tube through the airframe, I assume because I've flown in a Cessna 182 so equipped. Pooping, pack it out in your MRE bags.

escherplex 8y ago
Min KIAS, moderate flaps on a 172 I believe is 50kts (93km/h) and they could easily "recycle" their MRE bags during refueling runs paralleling deserted highways (with subsequent collection presumably by 'this road maintained by local Lions Club chapter' personnel -joke- ) Isn't it odd that the comment with the most additional comments in this post involves bathroom activities?

cyberferret 8y ago

From another article posted above: > This also inevitably leads one to the question: how did they use the bathroom? Well, because the Cessna 172 doesn’t come standard with a toilet, and there was no room to install a permanent one, Timm and Cook had to rig their own system. This took the form of a folding camp toilet and plastic bags. Once they had been used, the plastic bags were then disposed of over unpopulated areas in the desert around Blythe. According to Mark Hall-Patton, the administrator of the Clark County Museum system in Las Vegas, “I once asked John’s widow if they handed down the waste during refueling runs. She said, ‘No. That’s why it’s so green around Blythe.’ ”

cf498 8y ago
Steep face rock climbing has the same problem. If you climb for days on a vertical cliff, there is really just one directs where all the waste has to go. Better watch out that it doesnt hit your rope or some climber below you.