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As has been noted by others, the emoting is a distraction. I could only watch this for a few seconds. Another thing: why are they reporting speed in miles per
by bluenose69 2y ago
As has been noted by others, the emoting is a distraction. I could only watch this for a few seconds.
Another thing: why are they reporting speed in miles per hour, and altitude in feet? Surely anybody interested in space is familiar with SI units.
- Tankenstein 2y agoJust a guess, but aerospace generally works with feet for altitude and knots/mph for airspeed, internationally. I’m doing a PPL in Europe and we, like everybody, use feet and knots/mph. I believe this is because the US have been on the forefront of aerospace regulation (a set of rules called the chicago convention is the basis of all air law) and aircraft manufacturing.
- throw5959 2y agoCan confirm, all aviation worldwide deals in feet and knots. It's also because it's much easier to do calculations on the fly (literally) - in your head. Metric is precise and logical but harder to use in stressful situations.
- curl-up 2y agoCan you please give some real-world example of why it's easier to do calculations? Not disputing what you say, just hard for me to imagine why it would be so.
- HPsquared 2y ago1 knot is about 100 ft/min which is very convenient for descent at a specific glide slope (i.e. for 100 knots ground speed at 5% slope you want 500 ft/min descent rate). Standard is 3° which is about 5%. Knots are also handy for navigation as 1 nautical mile equals 1 minute of latitude. And of course a knot is 1 nautical mile per hour. So if you're doing 300 knots, that's 5 degrees of latitude per hour. The units fit together nicely as a system.
- Dalewyn 2y agoThis sums it up. Metric is nice and clean tenths, but the real world is seldomly easily expressed in clean tenths. Another example: The feet is cleanly divisible in thirds, quarters, and twelfths, which is greatly appreciated in industry and particularly construction. Also to be bluntly mundane, almost everyone can just look down and have a rough measure of a foot which is good enough for daily use. Also, the "sterility" of metric doesn't do it any sentimental favours. Japan loves measuring size/volume in Tokyo Domes, for example.
- NotEvil 2y agoNot really, I have no idea what a foot is. But I can just look at yhe tiles and know they are 1*1 meter
- Dalewyn 2y agoIf you're an amputee I truly am sorry for you and hope the handicap hasn't disrupted your life too much. Jokes(...?) aside though, your absolute deference to precision is an example of why metric flies over people's heads. Feets, Tokyo Domes, arguably even nautical miles and so on are relatable at a human level unlike metric which is too nice and clean.
- notahacker 2y agoThis sort of argument is odd to someone in a country which uses both, where a yard is intuitively "a bit smaller than a metre", a pint corresponds to a pint glass or "about half a litre" rather than anything meaningful and I'm aware that a rod and a furlong are things but have absolutely no idea what they correspond to. A foot is comfortably bigger than the average foot size, and an inch really isn't an easier unit to approximate than a centimeter
- avmich 2y agoThe SI was specially aimed to reduce such meaningless discussions, yet we steel have big endians and little endians comparisons, long after the dust settled.
- plantain 2y agoCertainly not "worldwide". China uses metres. Recreational aircraft in Europe often use metres (almost all sailplanes).
- throw5959 2y agoNo glider I have ever stepped in used metres. It doesn't make any sense, the tower wants to hear feet and knots and will communicate using that.
- Tankenstein 2y agoThank you, I wasn't aware of China using metres. It turns out Russia uses them as well, confusingly below the transition level.
- inglor_cz 2y ago"Metric is precise and logical but harder to use in stressful situations." That fully depends on your cultural background. Feet, miles etc. are so foreign to me that I would be unable to calculate with them under stress. But I am not a pilot nor a navigator, so...
- throw5959 2y agoNo, it doesn't. I'm European, never used imperial before I became a pilot, and it's easier. Check it out, the formulas are much simpler to do in your head. Intuition doesn't matter, all that matters is that I can do the calculations quickly so I know I'm within parameter limits.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoI'm curious which ones you find easier? There or a few thermodynamics equations that are much more practical in SAE. This is because the many units are often developed out of within discipline experiment, whereas metric tries to use fundamental units across disciplines.
- throw5959 2y agoTake a look into a pilot handbook, they are all written down there.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoAre you saying that every single equation in the book is easier in SAE than metric?
- throw5959 2y agoNope
- lupusreal 2y agoYou can be just as precise with either system.
- raverbashing 2y agoNot for aerospace no And knots are not mph, they're "nautical miles per hour" which are a different measure (1nm is 1.8km, not 1.6km as the regular mile")
- Tankenstein 2y agoSorry, not a native speaker, I was under the impression that aerospace means air and space. I guess i meant aviation. I didn’t imply knots are mph, I used the slash to signify “or”. They are completely different units, but both are used. Sometimes the airspeed indicator even has two scales, one for kt and one for mph.
- MattPalmer1086 2y agoGlad to hear it wasn't just me being grumpy, I also found it immensely annoying and distracting.
- Tepix 2y agoPerhaps it's considered more patriotic to reject scientific units? I don't understand why they reserve 6 digits for the speed in mph either. Are they expecting it to go beyond 99,999 mph?
- justlikereddit 2y agoDo they also report the speed of light as Walmart parking lots per standard commercial tv break duration? Edit: as an Amazon product it would probably use Amazon(tm) cardboard box unit as the length metric and standardized warehouse drone toilet break as duration.
- Dalewyn 2y agoYou're trying to break free of Earth's gravity well, so you might as well use Freedom Units.
- justlikereddit 2y agoDo you count them as Freedoms per second or is time included in a Freedom?
- rqtwteye 2y agoDefinitely should be football fields or school buses to make it comprehensible for the average viewer. Or “2 times the speed of a bullet”
- justin66 2y ago> Another thing: why are they reporting speed in miles per hour, and altitude in feet? Surely anybody interested in space is familiar with SI units. The audience that matters most to them is Americans, and they're happy to accommodate even those who are less interested in space.
- bigstrat2003 2y agoWho cares what units they use? Anyone who is interested in space will have some knowledge of both kinds of units, and can do conversions if they need to.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]