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Passenger flight flying over Pacific reaches 822 MPH in jet stream
- throwup238 3y agohttps://archive.ph/uDpJn https://archive.ph/uDpJn
- ykl 3y agoI just flew on this same route on Eva last week and at one point the tailwind speed was 200mph. We were close to or over supersonic relative to the ground for most of the trip; we left like 20 minutes late and arrived over an hour early. The turbulence was pretty rough though; at three separate sections the captain had to make the cabin crew strap in and after the third section like that the captain clearly decided he was done and gunned the engines to take the plane up another 4000 feet. That El Niño effect on Pacific air currents right now is no joke.
- ulfw 3y ago> the captain clearly decided he was done and gunned the engines to take the plane up another 4000 feet That's not how civil aviation works, but never mind. Sounds like a neat story.
- geor9e 3y agoThe captain clearly decided he was done and radiod air traffic control for permission to go to +4000 ft and gunned the engines to take the plane up another 4000 feet is that better
- insaneirish 3y agoOr, they asked ATC if they had any idea what might be a smoother ride, and that's what ended up being suggested. If you listen to ATC radio at all, it's a lot more anecdotal than you'd otherwise suspect, with private planes that fly higher sometimes reporting smoother air at higher flight levels.
- bruce511 3y agoHonest question; is there air traffic control over the Pacific? I guess this was a China to US flight (can't read TFA), so maybe within land based radars? I'm no pilot, but I assumed over large open water it's pretty much "designated highways" with designated altitudes. But sure, if permission is needed I think it's implied in the original post that he got clearance to so. If theres more to "doesn't work like that" I'd be interested.
- phire 3y agoYou don't actually need radar to have air traffic control. It's just that ATC can't provide tracking services for the entire route. Instead, aircraft file their routes in advanced (which are either a series waypoints, or a fixed airway), and pilots occasionally radio in position updates as they progress. The airspace is still controlled, but without tracking, the separations are much larger. Any two aircraft that might be on the same route or might cross paths have different assigned altitudes, and they must communicate with ATC before changing altitude or route.
- ykl 3y agoWell, I assume he asked ATC and all of the usual stuff, but as an unaware passenger all I know is we climbed and then things got smoother. The engines sound super impressive when climbing.
- CalRobert 3y agoAges ago, United would let you listen to the radio Comms in the in seat audio. I miss that.
- ninthcat 3y agoNote that as a plane burns fuel, its maximum sustainable altitude and its most fuel-efficient altitude both increase. This explains why the pilots did not climb to a higher flight level earlier.
- bamboozled 3y agoFor the modern world: 822 MPH = 1322.881 km/h
- frankwiles 3y agoThank you for putting it that way. I swear if the rest of the world just poked fun at us for using it, we would probably change it. “Awww look honey, the Americans are still using miles and pounds, isn’t that precious..”
- teeray 3y agoSNL captured this well: https://youtu.be/JYqfVE-fykk https://youtu.be/JYqfVE-fykk
- CamperBob2 3y ago[flagged]
- readthenotes1 3y agoAre you Japanese? It has been a while since the USA made it to the Moon.
- CamperBob2 3y agoAre you Japanese? ¿ʞsɐ noʎ op ʎɥʍ 'oᴎ
- kube-system 3y agoThe last time NASA sent a spacecraft to the surface was technically 2009.
- bee_rider 3y agoMy detector must be broken, I can’t tell if this is sarcasm or not.
- remarkEon 3y ago
- jumploops 3y agoRecently learned about “mega” atmospheric rivers, apparently what caused the Great Flood of 1862[0]. I’m curious if changes in the jet stream are correlated/could be used to predict the next “mega” atmospheric river event. Any meteorologists around who could chime in? [0]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Flood_of_1862 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Flood_of_1862
- simne 3y agoI'm not meteorologist, but love aviation, so dig these things deep. For me, this case most probably example of Great climate event, which for some reason missed by scientists. What could trigger it, is light mystery, because even now scientific coverage of Earth is not constantly complete, and in 1862 existed whole regions without good scientific network (now, only some countries closed for science). Most probably, reason was some fluctuations of Gulf Stream or Supervolcano.
- lom 3y agoInteresting to see that 5 years ago 20mph slower was considered newsworthy: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19202532 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19202532