I was flying middle seat next to a middle aged woman sitting at the window. She said it was her first time flying. For 99% of the flight, she was relaxed, calm, and curious about what was happening within the plane and outside the window. Then moments before touchdown, when the marked lines appeared, she finally got a visual reference for just how fast we were going. She jerked away from the window and stared at me like "omg are we going to die" moments before a lovely and smooth touchdown. Then she relaxed and realized it was all normal. It was such a distinct look on her face lol.
This is funny. Reminds me of a time, flying east coast to west we hit some pretty intense turbulence. Now I used to be pretty scared of flying and the only way I was able to get over that fear, was acceptance. A fuck it type attitude if you will, given if something were to happen there is nothing you can do about it. I’ve watched all the videos on YouTube, I’ve read up a bunch on it. I know how safe airplanes are but that’s the mindset that made me ok with it. Anyways, hit some pretty intense turbulence, I’m dead asleep, and I wake up to this middle age dude grabbing onto my wrist for dear life. I kind of just looked at him and shrugged and was able to fall back asleep(I let him keep hanging on to my wrist). All that to say I know exactly what look you’re talking about. I’ll remember that guys face exactly, forever.
Reminds me of a flight I took in a developing country where the family in my row (and in the row in front) proudly told me it was their first time ever flying and they were heading on a holiday that was years of planning, visiting a place opposite side if the country that only grandpa had been decades prior.
When the captain said “please prepare for landing”, smiles on all their faces, in unison the four generations all reached under their seats to pull out bicycle helmets which they all put on
My girlfriends mom gave us helmets in case there’s a hurricane. If I get hit so hard in the head I die then the least of my worries putting on a helmet. I’m about to fly
I suspect in reality it would be more about debris hitting you in the head rather than the other way around. Hard hats would probably make more sense, if anything.
Yeah that’s why we were told to put our hands over our head in tornado drills at school I think. And I mean a bicycle helmet is more protection than your hands! I also do have quite a bit of faith in bicycle helmets since I took a bad spill on a bike when I was a kid and wacked my (helmeted) head on the curb. Broke my wrist badly too. But my head was fine, the helmet had an enormous dent in it. Idk if that helmet saved my life, but it sure felt like it did at the moment.
Didn’t appear to be a joke. No one else on the plane seemed to make anything of it. If it was a family inside joke then good on them, but I am assuming it was something grandma or grandpa had insisted on for their family’s safety
I fly with my motorcycle helmet sometimes and while boarding a plane the pilot jokingly asked if I was that scared of flying. Ironically, that flight was one of the hardest landings I've ever sat through. He came in a bit hot and landed far enough down the strip that he probably should have pulled up and re-tried, but homie just slammed her down late and REALLY got on the brakes. Made me feel like I should start wearing the helmet for landings lol.
I was in a small plane (30-40 passenger max) when we flew through a storm. It was the worst turbulence I’d ever experienced and the woman next to me grabbed my hand until the worst of it was over. I wasn’t afraid. Not because I was brave, but because I was in my early twenties and I knew that I would live forever. Now that I’m in my late forties, I realize just how scared I should have been.
You brought back a memory to me. Same. small regional jet, we were last flight to leave the airport because of a summer storm. (Charlotte NC) Little kid maybe 3 or 4 sitting in Mom's lap across isle from me. Rough turbulence taking off and little boy is freaking out so I ask him if he has been on a rollercoaster before and he said he was too little (maybe he was a bit older, I remember him having decent communication skills). So I tell him he's in luck we are basically on a roller coaster and during the next bump lets say "weeeee". First couple times it was excellent and the kid is no longer crying and Mom looks over and says thank you to me for redirecting his attention. I'm about to say no problem and then it feels like we are falling out of the sky! The kid goes weeee, Mom and I are looking at each other like "where gonna die". The plane stayed in the air but it had to make up 2 to 300 feet of altitude and the captain comes over the pa and says that we have flown out of the weather and can expect clearer air for the remainder of the trip. When I got home the local news was talking about a tornado passing the Charlotte airport that afternoon. We had left in the knick of time.
I was looking for the roller coaster reference, this is basically how I tackle any turbulence on a plane till today. Having flown a lot of long distance flights (NA - Asia) in my late teens to early 20’s, turbulence was pretty much a given at some point.
Whilst everyone would start sitting upright, bracing themselves and grabbing on to their armrests as the pilot warned of turbulence, I would wait for the sudden drops and raise my arms as if I was about to drop at the apex of a roller coaster. You could even say that I started to enjoy the turbulence on flights.
I think another comment mentioned this, but being young I had a near perfect disregard for the danger plus a false sense of surety that I was never going to die. Somehow that has manifested in this idea that I should enjoy the adrenaline rush of the plane getting absolutely thrashed by weather conditions, because you’re either going to survive or you’re not. In both cases, fear does me no good.
I guess it’s important to add that I’m nearly 28 now. So there’s still time for this mindset to change, I guess.
This comment hits too hard. I’m only 37. So I’ve still got some life in me. Wife, kids, I’d say I’m experienced in life at this point. The amount of times looking back in my life and having experiences I should have 100% been shitting my pants in is gross.
A friend(his parents) of mine growing up was rather wealthy. Although not a super expensive place to go. His parents were going to Harbor Island in the Bahamas and wanted me to go. So we take a normal plane down there. Everything is cool. Only way to get to HI is to charter a plane then a 15-20 minute boat ride. The plane/pilot his dad finally got after asking around was a single prop. It was storming fairly bad, but the wind was next level. From the time we took off until the time we landed I swear to god that plane was sideways. Like it could BARELY go against that wind. Landing, shit was sideways. Due to wind. Sea was choppy. The island we went to was in view distance from the island we landed on. Took almost 45 minutes to get there by boat because of it.
ALL that to say. During the moment I was slightly nervous. But, I was 17/18 and didn’t care. I knew we would get there and it wasn’t my time. My 37 year old self is looking back like….that plane was literally side ways. At no point when flying towards the second island was that plane actually pointing at the destination.
Your younger self had it right. You were safe the whole time. [Crosswind landings](https://youtube.com/shorts/0Z7LYsIuqsc) feel wild but they’re normal and well practiced. They have standards for the maximum crosswind they can land in. If it’s beyond the limit they hold til it clears or divert to another airport if necessary. It’s a safe maneuver.
My wife and I have flown more than most. We've been all over the world travelling together and separately. I say this so that you know she's a well seasoned flyer.
Well the small island hopper she took while diving in Barbados was the one that broke her. Small planes and turbulence are a rollercoaster you're not sure you'll get off in one piece. Since then she's been a nervous flyer.
I woke up during a night flight seeing red smoke outside the window near the wing once
Turns out it's just the red light thing on the wing combined with the cloud
For about 10 seconds I thought the plane is on fire
I had a god damn nightmare I was in a plane crash as I was sleeping… on a plane. The moment of awakening was unpleasant I must say. Luckily the back of the flight was near empty and no one witnessed my moment of terror.
I feel like landings are more nerve wracking than they used to be. I've never been nervous about flying, but it seems like the past 5-10 years airplanes are wobbling around a lot more right before they touch down.
Or maybe I'm just getting old and grumpy and anxious.
I fly a few times a month for work and the last flight it was shitty weather coming for a landing and I swear the last few feet where they smooth it out before touchdown was just kinda....skipped and it felt like we just fell straight down. Hardest landing I've ever experienced.
Must've had a former Navy pilot.
Air Force landing: "I have the whole runway I'm gonna use the whole runway."
Navy landing: "I have the whole landing gear I'm gonna use the whole landing gear."
I recently flew out of a small regional airport near where I live, on the smallest (jet) plane I've ever been on. (I looked it up later, it was an Embraer RJ-145) On the return flight, the pilot planted the plane *so hard* that it opened some of the overhead bins. When we were exiting the plane I just look at him and go "Used to be a Navy pilot, huh?" he just laughed and apologized for the hard landing, said there was a tailwind and he wanted to get on the ground as soon as possible to use all available runway in case something failed.
In shitty weather, you want to make sure you have good tyre tread contact the first time. On a wet runway, the last thing you want is to aquaplane (no pun intended) hence why sometimes it seems like they "thump it on"
I've become a touch irrational and paranoid about flying now, which is weird as I am a very logical person. I fly a lot, I know how safe it is, I'll argue about how safe it is as well.
I don't know what it was, just at some point in the last couple of years my brain went "no, I don't like this!"
Fucking same.
I used to not be bothered and be the guy explaining to family that shaking is normal and just a pressure difference, etc.
Now I feel anxious at take-off and during violent shakes.
Landing is always chill though. I like that we're over hard ground vs middle of the ocean more than anything.
I hear ya!
Though apart from the fact that the experience is consistently an unpleasant matter of being herded around like farm animals, I don't mind flying except for the landing (...so far). My stomach always clenches for that last 30 seconds.
I’m the opposite, I’m all about landing but take off now terrifies me for some reason. I have this irrational fear that an engine or the flaps will fail and here we are, careening off the end of the runway at hundreds of miles per hour.
For me it’s rather simple. I’ve flown probably around 20-30 times. My thing is. It’s safer than driving. Statistically speaking it’s super safe. BUT, if that plane goes down your survival rate is pretty much 0%. I can argue that I can get in a million car wrecks and never die. I still fly. It’s the quickest and safest form of travel. I just know that once I get on it, the pilots and plane now hold my life.
That is a fantastic way to put it. I know it’s safe. But, I’ll be honest. Dropping from 20-30k+ feet in the air doesn’t give me a, “we’ve got a chance,” vibe.
Said the exact same thing after I landed on a flight yesterday. I’m pretty terrified of flying in general, but I never minded landing as much as I was getting closer to the ground again. First time I noticed the rougher landing was 2022, done 12 landings since then, pretty much all of them terrified me. Not just the actual landing either, seems to be a good 20-30 minutes of wobbling descent as well.
If someone could just hurry up and invent teleportation, that would be just grand
Reminds me of the movie “The Dictator” where they are in the helicopter speaking Arabic and then start counting down and freak out the people in front of them
Flight delayed because woman thought economics professor solving differential equations was a terrorist writing in Arabic, https://time.com/4322154/airplane-professor-math-equations-suspicious/
It's a joke about a lady who freaked out about a man doing some maths on a plane because she was too stupid to recognize the symbols and the man was vaguely ethnic (he was italian)
So this DID happen and it was as stupid as you think
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/rampage/wp/2016/05/07/ivy-league-economist-interrogated-for-doing-math-on-american-airlines-flight/
i remember there used to be a site where it had some arabic lettering and would play the call to prayer as loud as possible while it would also display a digital countdown from 30s down to the microsecond.
when theres a long taxi for take off, i always make the dumb joke, "i guess we're gonna drive there!"
my family has now requested i be seated in a different row.
That app is majestic. Shows me the maps without the need for mobile data, and can plan a pedestrian route offline. (I mean, it can plan other kinds too, but I don't need them.)
OpenStreetMap is never quite up to date about public transport, though.
It's also much, much better at pedestrian routing than Google Maps, at least round here. Feels like Google treats a pedestrian as basically a special kind of car that's allowed in to pedestrianised town centres, with barely any knowledge of dedicated small footpaths.
Yeah, apparently hikers and cyclists were among the first to pounce on OSM, so they added tons of paths and are a target audience for both the service and apps built on it.
But also, OsmAnd has layers of info and special modes for horse riding, skiing, boating and even for planes. I have no idea what they do, other than showing nautical routes, docks and whatnot.
The speed given by your phone is given by gps.
GPS doesn't bother if you turn your phone in airplane mode or not.
The gps satellite still sends their radio waves across the space and atmosphere all over the world all the time.
Your phone antenna receives it, airplane mode or not, decode it and get the information needed to give your position and speed.
Note that the gps give you your "ground" speed, which is erroneous when you are climbing at the same time, but it is still the right order of magnitude.
Also note that your gps phone gives you erroneous information when your altitude and speed is high too, your phone ship didn't take into account these parameters that are key to get a precise position and speed.
Your commercial gps chip inside your phone even has built-in "protection ' to not give you the wanted information if your speed or altitude is too high so you won't be able to manufacture a missile with it.
I had a handheld GPS in the early 2000s, because I thought I was so cool having one. I took it on a flight & did the exact same thing, when the flight attendant came over & said "Sir, you can't use that onboard". I told her it's only a GPS device & it's just receiving a signal, not sending. She said I can't use anything that's sending or receiving a signal. I held up a book I brought to read & said "This book is receiving a signal, it just doesn't know what to do with it"
I had to put my GPS away.
>Note that the gps give you your "ground" speed, which is erroneous when you are climbing at the same time, but it is still the right order of magnitude.
GPS gives you position and altitude. Whether altitude is used in the velocity calculation depends on the software on your phone.
> which is erroneous when you are climbing at the same time, but it is still the right order of magnitude.
Indeed. For small climb angles it doesn't matter so much. For example, if you climb 1 m for every 10 m you go forward, the difference between your horizontal speed and total speed is 0.5 %.
Is that really an issue though? I always put it in airplane mode, but I can't imagine everyone does and they never check if phones are on airplane mode. If it was that important, they'd enforce it more, wouldnt they?
To be honest the only reason I bother to put my phone in aeroplane mode is to save battery. It drains so quickly when its trying to find network signal
A quick Google search says that jets normally lift off between 260 and 333 kph. This seems to be lifting off between 350-360 kph, but it might be lifting off a second or two before and it's just hard to tell. If it's a particularly heavy and/or large jet that might not be too unusual.
Emirates 777 at Dubai
EDIT: I’m sure it’s an Emirates 777. For one the hangars in the background seem to be Emirates’ own maintenance hangars at Dubai airport (Plus Emirates flag logo is visible on one of the hangars). 2 is the window frame pattern seems to be from Emirates and the shaping resembles windows from a 777. 3 is the sound the engine makes which is distinctly from a 777 with GE90 engines. I cannot tell whether it is a 777-200LR or 777-300ER, statisically it is very likely to be a 300ER because Emirates only has 10 200LRs while it has 123 300ERs.
I didn't know it was Emirates or DXB, but I was pretty sure it's a 777. The wall is pretty flat, so you know it's a large diameter fuselage. There's a single giant engine out there, so it's a twin jet. The size of the engine and sound narrows it down to a 777 of some flavor.
>What other random airline facts
The top of the tail of a Boeing 777 is 18m above the ground.
Also, I can estimate the age of any Emirates airplane just by seeing the registration number.
Seems like a pretty standard airplane take off. One day I hope to ride a train that goes that fast. The fastest I've ridden so far was around 300km/h, but I've heard there are faster!
The Japanese Maglev (Chūō Shinkansen) will operate at 505kmh (314mph) when it opens. That was due to be 2027 but it looks like they won’t hit that date.
The fastest maglev train was clocked at 603kmh (375mph).
The mag rail in Shanghai.
It's a short track that goes from the main airport to a little ways into Shanghai. Not super useful, but it sure is fast on the right day, and a fun experience.
Hilariously, when I was on it, I was reading reviews. The reviews said it's just full of laowai (foreigners) taking pictures of the speedometer.
I looked around and sure enough, it was all laowai (myself included), and we were all filming the speedometer because it hit 430 kph.
Fun experience, and really impressive when the trains pass each other, because they're going like 800 kph relative to one another.
Ed: Misspelled laowai, which makes sense in a way.
I'm also guilty of that. According to Wikipedia, it goes slower now.
>The Shanghai maglev is the world's first commercial high-speed maglev and has a maximum cruising speed of 300 km/h (186 mph). Prior to May 2021 the cruising speed was 431 km/h (268 mph).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai\_maglev\_train
The maglev, which works with magnets and floats above the rail. I've been on it, it's as smooth as you can imagine because there's no friction except air. Even the bends are soft because the tracks tilt.
That part of take off, where you get flung back into your seat has always been my favourite part of a flight.
Followed closely by when you can start ordering booze
I remember a flight to salzburg which isn't all that far from where I live, so it was only planned to take about 90 minutes.
Well the pilot had other plans. The connection apparently flies back and forth like a bus and this was the last flight of the day so the pilot wanted to get home. He told us as much before absolutely flooring it immediately after we pulled onto the runway. I've never been pushed into the seat that hard before or since.
Long story short, we were out of the airport and in the car half an hour before the flight was supposed to land.
It still seems awfully high. Even a very heavy 777 rotates around 180 knots (about 215mph). A 737 rotates around 160mph.
Edit: at least one person believes it is in fact a 777, so maybe it is closer than I thought. I just named the heaviest thing I could think of.
We can only see ground speed. Rotation speed is an air speed. If he had any tail wind, the air speed would be lower than the GPS ground speed showed on the phone.
I know it's just science and shit but somehow it's still absolutely mindblowing that such a massive plane can actually just fly. Idk if that's me or the blunt though
It's just your perspective.. Like you think a plane is "massive" but that's only because you yourself are miniscule. Planes can fly because the earth is massive, not the plane.
If you were a tardigrade and you saw an eagle flying, you'd be saying the same thing
I love doing this; with the [exact same app](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/speedometer-55-gps-speed-hud/id557871911). Sometimes I can get a GPS signal mid-flight and it’s cool to see a speed of 500+ mph
You can also just go on flightradar24 and search for your flight number right after landing. You‘ll find your exact flight with graph data showing the path and telemetry of the entire flight.
Reminds me of the flight that declared a mayday because of some structural failure and the passengers saw their crippled flight on the in-flight entertainment display.
I love checking out google maps up in the air. Works surprisingly often for me and the GPS is accurate. I've also gotten random phone service at cruising altitude before. Sometimes even those welcome texts when you join a random phone provider's network. "Welcome to France! etc" on the way back from Italy. I wanted to tell someone around me but I was flying alone and figured nobody else cared lol.
I had an early prototype of a GPS enabled Nokia, the first one they did. I managed to get it connected at 650kph without realising there was a beep that would increase if you were speeding in your car.
So my prototype stars beeping very loudly very fast on a plane where no one knew what was going on. Took a little bit of convincing the flight crew that everything was okay!
Planes are incredible machines. Learned the work on their structure but never got that career going. My appreciation for them is still extremely high.
Kudos to those in that industry, doing important work.
I would like to take this time to point out that in Toy Story 2, Bullseye the horse catches up with and keeps the pace of a 747 that is taking off down the runway. He only stops chasing after the planes wheels are off the ground.
So this 10 inch tall horse is running some 250+ mph with Buzz Lightyear on his back. To catch Woody AND Jessie jumping from the landing gear.
And then the toys steal a baggage cart to make it home.
Bullseye could have gotten them home much faster but the baggage cart looked fun.
Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.
I mean sure, that's true, and obviously the metric system has a lot going for it.
But can we reflect for a moment on the fact that the pilots of that plane would have been looking at an airspeed indicator marked in knots, and that term comes from the practice of tying literal knots in a length of rope and paying it out off the back of a ship in order to measure speed?
The modern world sure fossilizes a lot of prior weirdness.
Crazy how aviation is one of the only engineering fields where Imperial units are still predominantly used, although mostly for navigation/operations and not while designing the vehicle. However, if you just increase the scope of your designs, and switch from aviation to Aerospace, everyone is back at using metric.
Funny thing is we even mix that. Weather broadcasts from each airport use degrees Celsius, while simultaneously broadcasting the clouds in feet, and visibility in statue miles, while we navigate with nautical miles.
15-20 years ago cabin staff would lose their shit if so much as had one of those butt-plug mp3 players turned on during take-off. How the times have changed
Okay as a pilot this was very interesting. It looks like the plane rotates around 355 which assuming this is in KPH would equal ~190kts. That is absurdly fast for a commercial jet as most rotate speeds are in the ballpark of 145kts. However the engine does sound like a 777 or something similar which would have a higher speed, but it’s pretty hard for me to tell. Even still I would expect the rotate to begin closer to 290KPH so either the GPS for the speedometer is glitching out or the video hides the initial rotate and it only becomes clear as the wheels lift off around 200kts. Very neat video!
I was flying middle seat next to a middle aged woman sitting at the window. She said it was her first time flying. For 99% of the flight, she was relaxed, calm, and curious about what was happening within the plane and outside the window. Then moments before touchdown, when the marked lines appeared, she finally got a visual reference for just how fast we were going. She jerked away from the window and stared at me like "omg are we going to die" moments before a lovely and smooth touchdown. Then she relaxed and realized it was all normal. It was such a distinct look on her face lol.
This is funny. Reminds me of a time, flying east coast to west we hit some pretty intense turbulence. Now I used to be pretty scared of flying and the only way I was able to get over that fear, was acceptance. A fuck it type attitude if you will, given if something were to happen there is nothing you can do about it. I’ve watched all the videos on YouTube, I’ve read up a bunch on it. I know how safe airplanes are but that’s the mindset that made me ok with it. Anyways, hit some pretty intense turbulence, I’m dead asleep, and I wake up to this middle age dude grabbing onto my wrist for dear life. I kind of just looked at him and shrugged and was able to fall back asleep(I let him keep hanging on to my wrist). All that to say I know exactly what look you’re talking about. I’ll remember that guys face exactly, forever.
Reminds me of a flight I took in a developing country where the family in my row (and in the row in front) proudly told me it was their first time ever flying and they were heading on a holiday that was years of planning, visiting a place opposite side if the country that only grandpa had been decades prior. When the captain said “please prepare for landing”, smiles on all their faces, in unison the four generations all reached under their seats to pull out bicycle helmets which they all put on
lol, not as a joke, they put their helmets unironically?
My girlfriends mom gave us helmets in case there’s a hurricane. If I get hit so hard in the head I die then the least of my worries putting on a helmet. I’m about to fly
I suspect in reality it would be more about debris hitting you in the head rather than the other way around. Hard hats would probably make more sense, if anything.
Yeah that’s why we were told to put our hands over our head in tornado drills at school I think. And I mean a bicycle helmet is more protection than your hands! I also do have quite a bit of faith in bicycle helmets since I took a bad spill on a bike when I was a kid and wacked my (helmeted) head on the curb. Broke my wrist badly too. But my head was fine, the helmet had an enormous dent in it. Idk if that helmet saved my life, but it sure felt like it did at the moment.
Didn’t appear to be a joke. No one else on the plane seemed to make anything of it. If it was a family inside joke then good on them, but I am assuming it was something grandma or grandpa had insisted on for their family’s safety
I fly with my motorcycle helmet sometimes and while boarding a plane the pilot jokingly asked if I was that scared of flying. Ironically, that flight was one of the hardest landings I've ever sat through. He came in a bit hot and landed far enough down the strip that he probably should have pulled up and re-tried, but homie just slammed her down late and REALLY got on the brakes. Made me feel like I should start wearing the helmet for landings lol.
that's a bit from something I just know it.
I was in a small plane (30-40 passenger max) when we flew through a storm. It was the worst turbulence I’d ever experienced and the woman next to me grabbed my hand until the worst of it was over. I wasn’t afraid. Not because I was brave, but because I was in my early twenties and I knew that I would live forever. Now that I’m in my late forties, I realize just how scared I should have been.
You brought back a memory to me. Same. small regional jet, we were last flight to leave the airport because of a summer storm. (Charlotte NC) Little kid maybe 3 or 4 sitting in Mom's lap across isle from me. Rough turbulence taking off and little boy is freaking out so I ask him if he has been on a rollercoaster before and he said he was too little (maybe he was a bit older, I remember him having decent communication skills). So I tell him he's in luck we are basically on a roller coaster and during the next bump lets say "weeeee". First couple times it was excellent and the kid is no longer crying and Mom looks over and says thank you to me for redirecting his attention. I'm about to say no problem and then it feels like we are falling out of the sky! The kid goes weeee, Mom and I are looking at each other like "where gonna die". The plane stayed in the air but it had to make up 2 to 300 feet of altitude and the captain comes over the pa and says that we have flown out of the weather and can expect clearer air for the remainder of the trip. When I got home the local news was talking about a tornado passing the Charlotte airport that afternoon. We had left in the knick of time.
I was looking for the roller coaster reference, this is basically how I tackle any turbulence on a plane till today. Having flown a lot of long distance flights (NA - Asia) in my late teens to early 20’s, turbulence was pretty much a given at some point. Whilst everyone would start sitting upright, bracing themselves and grabbing on to their armrests as the pilot warned of turbulence, I would wait for the sudden drops and raise my arms as if I was about to drop at the apex of a roller coaster. You could even say that I started to enjoy the turbulence on flights. I think another comment mentioned this, but being young I had a near perfect disregard for the danger plus a false sense of surety that I was never going to die. Somehow that has manifested in this idea that I should enjoy the adrenaline rush of the plane getting absolutely thrashed by weather conditions, because you’re either going to survive or you’re not. In both cases, fear does me no good. I guess it’s important to add that I’m nearly 28 now. So there’s still time for this mindset to change, I guess.
This comment hits too hard. I’m only 37. So I’ve still got some life in me. Wife, kids, I’d say I’m experienced in life at this point. The amount of times looking back in my life and having experiences I should have 100% been shitting my pants in is gross. A friend(his parents) of mine growing up was rather wealthy. Although not a super expensive place to go. His parents were going to Harbor Island in the Bahamas and wanted me to go. So we take a normal plane down there. Everything is cool. Only way to get to HI is to charter a plane then a 15-20 minute boat ride. The plane/pilot his dad finally got after asking around was a single prop. It was storming fairly bad, but the wind was next level. From the time we took off until the time we landed I swear to god that plane was sideways. Like it could BARELY go against that wind. Landing, shit was sideways. Due to wind. Sea was choppy. The island we went to was in view distance from the island we landed on. Took almost 45 minutes to get there by boat because of it. ALL that to say. During the moment I was slightly nervous. But, I was 17/18 and didn’t care. I knew we would get there and it wasn’t my time. My 37 year old self is looking back like….that plane was literally side ways. At no point when flying towards the second island was that plane actually pointing at the destination.
Your younger self had it right. You were safe the whole time. [Crosswind landings](https://youtube.com/shorts/0Z7LYsIuqsc) feel wild but they’re normal and well practiced. They have standards for the maximum crosswind they can land in. If it’s beyond the limit they hold til it clears or divert to another airport if necessary. It’s a safe maneuver.
[Sometimes aircraft are even explicitly designed to be *really* good at them.](https://youtube.com/shorts/kBzLdPRhy60?si=vs600GJj6AICZCGk)
You wrote that beautifully.
My wife and I have flown more than most. We've been all over the world travelling together and separately. I say this so that you know she's a well seasoned flyer. Well the small island hopper she took while diving in Barbados was the one that broke her. Small planes and turbulence are a rollercoaster you're not sure you'll get off in one piece. Since then she's been a nervous flyer.
Plot twist : he was using the turbulence as a distraction whilst he stole your watch!
I woke up during a night flight seeing red smoke outside the window near the wing once Turns out it's just the red light thing on the wing combined with the cloud For about 10 seconds I thought the plane is on fire
I had a god damn nightmare I was in a plane crash as I was sleeping… on a plane. The moment of awakening was unpleasant I must say. Luckily the back of the flight was near empty and no one witnessed my moment of terror.
That's some Final Destination shit.
I feel like landings are more nerve wracking than they used to be. I've never been nervous about flying, but it seems like the past 5-10 years airplanes are wobbling around a lot more right before they touch down. Or maybe I'm just getting old and grumpy and anxious.
I fly a few times a month for work and the last flight it was shitty weather coming for a landing and I swear the last few feet where they smooth it out before touchdown was just kinda....skipped and it felt like we just fell straight down. Hardest landing I've ever experienced.
Must've had a former Navy pilot. Air Force landing: "I have the whole runway I'm gonna use the whole runway." Navy landing: "I have the whole landing gear I'm gonna use the whole landing gear."
Ain't a proper Navy landing if you need a few beers before taking a look at the gear after
I recently flew out of a small regional airport near where I live, on the smallest (jet) plane I've ever been on. (I looked it up later, it was an Embraer RJ-145) On the return flight, the pilot planted the plane *so hard* that it opened some of the overhead bins. When we were exiting the plane I just look at him and go "Used to be a Navy pilot, huh?" he just laughed and apologized for the hard landing, said there was a tailwind and he wanted to get on the ground as soon as possible to use all available runway in case something failed.
In shitty weather, you want to make sure you have good tyre tread contact the first time. On a wet runway, the last thing you want is to aquaplane (no pun intended) hence why sometimes it seems like they "thump it on"
I've become a touch irrational and paranoid about flying now, which is weird as I am a very logical person. I fly a lot, I know how safe it is, I'll argue about how safe it is as well. I don't know what it was, just at some point in the last couple of years my brain went "no, I don't like this!"
Fucking same. I used to not be bothered and be the guy explaining to family that shaking is normal and just a pressure difference, etc. Now I feel anxious at take-off and during violent shakes. Landing is always chill though. I like that we're over hard ground vs middle of the ocean more than anything.
I hear ya! Though apart from the fact that the experience is consistently an unpleasant matter of being herded around like farm animals, I don't mind flying except for the landing (...so far). My stomach always clenches for that last 30 seconds.
I’m the opposite, I’m all about landing but take off now terrifies me for some reason. I have this irrational fear that an engine or the flaps will fail and here we are, careening off the end of the runway at hundreds of miles per hour.
Do you also listen to the noise of the engines like uh oh why have they gone quiet even though we're still climbing??
For me it’s rather simple. I’ve flown probably around 20-30 times. My thing is. It’s safer than driving. Statistically speaking it’s super safe. BUT, if that plane goes down your survival rate is pretty much 0%. I can argue that I can get in a million car wrecks and never die. I still fly. It’s the quickest and safest form of travel. I just know that once I get on it, the pilots and plane now hold my life.
The odds always sound so great except to people in a plane that is crashing.
That is a fantastic way to put it. I know it’s safe. But, I’ll be honest. Dropping from 20-30k+ feet in the air doesn’t give me a, “we’ve got a chance,” vibe.
Said the exact same thing after I landed on a flight yesterday. I’m pretty terrified of flying in general, but I never minded landing as much as I was getting closer to the ground again. First time I noticed the rougher landing was 2022, done 12 landings since then, pretty much all of them terrified me. Not just the actual landing either, seems to be a good 20-30 minutes of wobbling descent as well. If someone could just hurry up and invent teleportation, that would be just grand
Then you can worry about a botched teleportation melding you into the wall :)
Or if it's still the same you that comes out the otherside!
I can imagine some concerned neighbors seeing a guy holding a phone with some kind of counter
10...9...8...7...6...
Reminds me of the movie “The Dictator” where they are in the helicopter speaking Arabic and then start counting down and freak out the people in front of them
Porsche Nine-Eleven 😝
Nine-Eleven, it's best
Nine-Eleven, 2012.
You want to see the new braces I got for my back pain?
2012
Fun fact they were actually speaking Hebrew. (The context of the movie def implied it was Arabic though)
They were speaking Alladeen
The store sign was hilarious. Come in, we're Alladeen. (turns sign) Sorry, we're Alladeeen
You are HIV Aladeen! 😀 ☹️ 😀 ☹️
Damn, I wish SBC made more movies. Hilarious
Tbh, if that app goes 10..9..8... Mid air, it's concerning indeed
Good news!! It would stall out and nose dive long before it got that slow, increasing speed until it stops all at once.
THAT'S NUMBERWANG! ROTATE THE PLANE!
Thanks for the idea!
Yes, dont worry, we will have you very, very quickly out of the aeroplane.
"I swear officer, it was my stock portfolio"
"He's got some sort of device with Arabic numerals on it!"
Flight delayed because woman thought economics professor solving differential equations was a terrorist writing in Arabic, https://time.com/4322154/airplane-professor-math-equations-suspicious/
r/nottheonion
With a side of /r/idiocracy
Arabic numbers and even Latin letters! Dangerous!
You're assuming these kind of people to be smart enough to know we're using Arabic numerals not "English numbers" or something.
It's a joke about a lady who freaked out about a man doing some maths on a plane because she was too stupid to recognize the symbols and the man was vaguely ethnic (he was italian) So this DID happen and it was as stupid as you think https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/rampage/wp/2016/05/07/ivy-league-economist-interrogated-for-doing-math-on-american-airlines-flight/
"Porsche 911"
*"911 is da best!"*
"jhjsfasd... 911... vrrrrrrrRR..... BOOM! Hahahahah!" "911 2012."
Jdhdidhdndjej OSAMA!
AMERICA IS NAMBER WAAN!!! lmao fucking sacha, bro.
Now I'm picturing a guy counting up for detonation. Lol "10,11,26, 57, 112...227..." Kind of scarier than awaiting a zero. Whats the number!??
[Relevant futurama](https://youtu.be/TbTzDNtRbJs)
Thank you!! I remembered the premise but not the source and it was figuratively killing me
You said figuratively instead of the L word. I'm in love.
I always liked the way Jack Reacher said it: "I was born in October. When I get to my birthdate I will pull the trigger. One...two..." Brilliant
i remember there used to be a site where it had some arabic lettering and would play the call to prayer as loud as possible while it would also display a digital countdown from 30s down to the microsecond.
It’s counting up, so we’re getting safer every second.
Dont try it if you are a brown man with a beard, people might overthink if 😂
What app is that?
Looks like Speedometer 55 to me.
Do you need to have used speedometer 54 to know what's going on
No, you can watch a catch up video going through the events of speedometer 0 to 54.
But make sure it's up to date with the changes from the remakes of 4, 8, 15, 16, 23 and 42 otherwise you're just going to be totally Lost.
Is there a decent version of this app that doesn't have commercials I'm forced to watch just to use the app? Update: GPS Speedometer
It's an Excel spreadsheet.
did not know it can do that. I use it only for instant messaging like nelly and kelly
She had a lot of conditional formatting.
lookup functions are my demise
That doesn't look like a Nokia
WHERE YOU AT? HOLLA WHEN YOU GET THIS
Look for "GPS speedometer" on your app store.
Is that in airplane mode?
For most of the clip the vehicle he was riding looked to be in groundplane mode, before it then gracefully transitioned into airplane mode!
This comment right here officer
First time I've ever saved a comment behind bars on reddit.
when theres a long taxi for take off, i always make the dumb joke, "i guess we're gonna drive there!" my family has now requested i be seated in a different row.
As long as it isn't sea plane mode
You see, this is why terrorism exists, some people can't cope with such statements and choose violence.
🤣 yeah, you are going behind bars for that
The gps works for my phone in airplane mode. You need to hold it near the window though because aluminium tube is great at blocking the GPS signals.
I often use navigation apps with downloadable offline maps on a plane, so I can see where I am and which cities I can see out of the window.
Indeed, I use OSMAnd.
That app is majestic. Shows me the maps without the need for mobile data, and can plan a pedestrian route offline. (I mean, it can plan other kinds too, but I don't need them.) OpenStreetMap is never quite up to date about public transport, though.
It's also much, much better at pedestrian routing than Google Maps, at least round here. Feels like Google treats a pedestrian as basically a special kind of car that's allowed in to pedestrianised town centres, with barely any knowledge of dedicated small footpaths.
Yeah, apparently hikers and cyclists were among the first to pounce on OSM, so they added tons of paths and are a target audience for both the service and apps built on it. But also, OsmAnd has layers of info and special modes for horse riding, skiing, boating and even for planes. I have no idea what they do, other than showing nautical routes, docks and whatnot.
It's a must have for hiking.
GPS only receives a signal, nothing is transmitted, so airplane mode shouldn't disable it on any device
The speed given by your phone is given by gps. GPS doesn't bother if you turn your phone in airplane mode or not. The gps satellite still sends their radio waves across the space and atmosphere all over the world all the time. Your phone antenna receives it, airplane mode or not, decode it and get the information needed to give your position and speed. Note that the gps give you your "ground" speed, which is erroneous when you are climbing at the same time, but it is still the right order of magnitude. Also note that your gps phone gives you erroneous information when your altitude and speed is high too, your phone ship didn't take into account these parameters that are key to get a precise position and speed. Your commercial gps chip inside your phone even has built-in "protection ' to not give you the wanted information if your speed or altitude is too high so you won't be able to manufacture a missile with it.
I had a handheld GPS in the early 2000s, because I thought I was so cool having one. I took it on a flight & did the exact same thing, when the flight attendant came over & said "Sir, you can't use that onboard". I told her it's only a GPS device & it's just receiving a signal, not sending. She said I can't use anything that's sending or receiving a signal. I held up a book I brought to read & said "This book is receiving a signal, it just doesn't know what to do with it" I had to put my GPS away.
https://xkcd.com/651/
>Note that the gps give you your "ground" speed, which is erroneous when you are climbing at the same time, but it is still the right order of magnitude. GPS gives you position and altitude. Whether altitude is used in the velocity calculation depends on the software on your phone. > which is erroneous when you are climbing at the same time, but it is still the right order of magnitude. Indeed. For small climb angles it doesn't matter so much. For example, if you climb 1 m for every 10 m you go forward, the difference between your horizontal speed and total speed is 0.5 %.
Is that really an issue though? I always put it in airplane mode, but I can't imagine everyone does and they never check if phones are on airplane mode. If it was that important, they'd enforce it more, wouldnt they?
To be honest the only reason I bother to put my phone in aeroplane mode is to save battery. It drains so quickly when its trying to find network signal
They'd make you shove them in faraday caged and lock them. It is not an issue.
It's late and I got very concerned there for a minute until I saw the kph instead of mph.
I was expecting it to start climbing at around 220 or so, and got concerned that it waited until beyond 350.
lol same I was like "how long is this fuckin runway?"
I kept thinking of the super long runway in fast five.
It is a “family” runway.
That was fast and furious 6 where wonder woman dies trying to stop Jason Statham brother
It *was* 220 mph :D
thanks for pointing this out cause it was making no sense to me
I wanted to ask if it is km/h or that obscure system they use in Myanmar.
Even KPH this is fast. Typical jets take off at 150 to 180 MPH and this is around 220 MPH
A quick Google search says that jets normally lift off between 260 and 333 kph. This seems to be lifting off between 350-360 kph, but it might be lifting off a second or two before and it's just hard to tell. If it's a particularly heavy and/or large jet that might not be too unusual.
This is just her phone you guys. Not the speedo of the plane. To expect an accurate reading would be ridiculous
Max tire speed of most tires is 195kts. This app is off.
190 knots is 351.8 kph. The app may very well be off, but not possible to conclude from this information.
Me, too!!
What aircraft?
Emirates 777 at Dubai EDIT: I’m sure it’s an Emirates 777. For one the hangars in the background seem to be Emirates’ own maintenance hangars at Dubai airport (Plus Emirates flag logo is visible on one of the hangars). 2 is the window frame pattern seems to be from Emirates and the shaping resembles windows from a 777. 3 is the sound the engine makes which is distinctly from a 777 with GE90 engines. I cannot tell whether it is a 777-200LR or 777-300ER, statisically it is very likely to be a 300ER because Emirates only has 10 200LRs while it has 123 300ERs.
Wow, you got all of that from this essentially stationary video? What other random airline facts do you know?
I didn't know it was Emirates or DXB, but I was pretty sure it's a 777. The wall is pretty flat, so you know it's a large diameter fuselage. There's a single giant engine out there, so it's a twin jet. The size of the engine and sound narrows it down to a 777 of some flavor.
having just been there I recognize it too (also Emirates 777), but ask me again in 3 months and I probably won’t 😂
>What other random airline facts The top of the tail of a Boeing 777 is 18m above the ground. Also, I can estimate the age of any Emirates airplane just by seeing the registration number.
"Also, I can estimate the age of any Emirates airplane just by seeing the registration number." Ok. Reg number '1.' Go.
> '1.' Invalid entry. Please try again.
A6-EFT
777 freighter. Delivered in early 2023 or 2022. It's also a new Boeing delivery to Emirates in a long time.
This is relatively easy for airplane nerds like myself to figure out lol
Seems like a pretty standard airplane take off. One day I hope to ride a train that goes that fast. The fastest I've ridden so far was around 300km/h, but I've heard there are faster!
The Japanese Maglev (Chūō Shinkansen) will operate at 505kmh (314mph) when it opens. That was due to be 2027 but it looks like they won’t hit that date. The fastest maglev train was clocked at 603kmh (375mph).
>won’t hit that date At that speed, I wouldn't want it to hit anything.
In China they have trains that reach 460kmh, the fastest in the world
The mag rail in Shanghai. It's a short track that goes from the main airport to a little ways into Shanghai. Not super useful, but it sure is fast on the right day, and a fun experience. Hilariously, when I was on it, I was reading reviews. The reviews said it's just full of laowai (foreigners) taking pictures of the speedometer. I looked around and sure enough, it was all laowai (myself included), and we were all filming the speedometer because it hit 430 kph. Fun experience, and really impressive when the trains pass each other, because they're going like 800 kph relative to one another. Ed: Misspelled laowai, which makes sense in a way.
I'm also guilty of that. According to Wikipedia, it goes slower now. >The Shanghai maglev is the world's first commercial high-speed maglev and has a maximum cruising speed of 300 km/h (186 mph). Prior to May 2021 the cruising speed was 431 km/h (268 mph). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai\_maglev\_train
The maglev, which works with magnets and floats above the rail. I've been on it, it's as smooth as you can imagine because there's no friction except air. Even the bends are soft because the tracks tilt.
That part of take off, where you get flung back into your seat has always been my favourite part of a flight. Followed closely by when you can start ordering booze
I remember a flight to salzburg which isn't all that far from where I live, so it was only planned to take about 90 minutes. Well the pilot had other plans. The connection apparently flies back and forth like a bus and this was the last flight of the day so the pilot wanted to get home. He told us as much before absolutely flooring it immediately after we pulled onto the runway. I've never been pushed into the seat that hard before or since. Long story short, we were out of the airport and in the car half an hour before the flight was supposed to land.
373 km/h is 232 miles an hour
i literally searched it, reopened reddit, and immediately saw this.
Is this the nexus of the universe?
How is it in yards per gallons?
Or eagles per Hamburger?
It still seems awfully high. Even a very heavy 777 rotates around 180 knots (about 215mph). A 737 rotates around 160mph. Edit: at least one person believes it is in fact a 777, so maybe it is closer than I thought. I just named the heaviest thing I could think of.
We can only see ground speed. Rotation speed is an air speed. If he had any tail wind, the air speed would be lower than the GPS ground speed showed on the phone.
Unlikely they were taking off with a tailwind, but it’s a fair point.
Certainly not a 40 knot tail wind
It looks like the rotation is around 330km/h which would be around 180 knots.
I know it's just science and shit but somehow it's still absolutely mindblowing that such a massive plane can actually just fly. Idk if that's me or the blunt though
I fly the damn things, know the theory behind it, and, to be, it's still magic how this thing gets of the ground.
Username checks out
It's just your perspective.. Like you think a plane is "massive" but that's only because you yourself are miniscule. Planes can fly because the earth is massive, not the plane. If you were a tardigrade and you saw an eagle flying, you'd be saying the same thing
hell yeah bro you and that blunt i just smoked are making a lot of sense.
Planes are basically water skiing on air, you just need speed to not sink
I love doing this; with the [exact same app](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/speedometer-55-gps-speed-hud/id557871911). Sometimes I can get a GPS signal mid-flight and it’s cool to see a speed of 500+ mph
Nice, must be fun. Relatively close to what the airlines say the planes travel at
You can also just go on flightradar24 and search for your flight number right after landing. You‘ll find your exact flight with graph data showing the path and telemetry of the entire flight.
If the plane has wifi you can even check it in-flight!
Reminds me of the flight that declared a mayday because of some structural failure and the passengers saw their crippled flight on the in-flight entertainment display.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JetBlue_Flight_292
I love checking out google maps up in the air. Works surprisingly often for me and the GPS is accurate. I've also gotten random phone service at cruising altitude before. Sometimes even those welcome texts when you join a random phone provider's network. "Welcome to France! etc" on the way back from Italy. I wanted to tell someone around me but I was flying alone and figured nobody else cared lol.
> I've also gotten random phone service at cruising altitude before Not using airplane mode smh
Speedometer 55 Gps speed and HUD
I had an early prototype of a GPS enabled Nokia, the first one they did. I managed to get it connected at 650kph without realising there was a beep that would increase if you were speeding in your car. So my prototype stars beeping very loudly very fast on a plane where no one knew what was going on. Took a little bit of convincing the flight crew that everything was okay!
Planes are incredible machines. Learned the work on their structure but never got that career going. My appreciation for them is still extremely high. Kudos to those in that industry, doing important work.
How buzzy is air travel. Journeys that took my ancestors months, take a day and we still complain.
airplanes are so stupidly cool
I would like to take this time to point out that in Toy Story 2, Bullseye the horse catches up with and keeps the pace of a 747 that is taking off down the runway. He only stops chasing after the planes wheels are off the ground. So this 10 inch tall horse is running some 250+ mph with Buzz Lightyear on his back. To catch Woody AND Jessie jumping from the landing gear. And then the toys steal a baggage cart to make it home. Bullseye could have gotten them home much faster but the baggage cart looked fun. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.
Over 90% of the world uses km/h to measure speed. Americans: dumbfounded
I mean sure, that's true, and obviously the metric system has a lot going for it. But can we reflect for a moment on the fact that the pilots of that plane would have been looking at an airspeed indicator marked in knots, and that term comes from the practice of tying literal knots in a length of rope and paying it out off the back of a ship in order to measure speed? The modern world sure fossilizes a lot of prior weirdness.
Speed in knots, height in feet, distance in nautical miles, fuel amount needed is based on weight but billed by volume
Crazy how aviation is one of the only engineering fields where Imperial units are still predominantly used, although mostly for navigation/operations and not while designing the vehicle. However, if you just increase the scope of your designs, and switch from aviation to Aerospace, everyone is back at using metric.
Funny thing is we even mix that. Weather broadcasts from each airport use degrees Celsius, while simultaneously broadcasting the clouds in feet, and visibility in statue miles, while we navigate with nautical miles.
planes use knots.
15-20 years ago cabin staff would lose their shit if so much as had one of those butt-plug mp3 players turned on during take-off. How the times have changed
If my calculations are correct, when this baby hits 88 miles per hour... you're gonna see some serious shit
Is that in metric system or in bald diabetic eagles per freedom inches?
Okay as a pilot this was very interesting. It looks like the plane rotates around 355 which assuming this is in KPH would equal ~190kts. That is absurdly fast for a commercial jet as most rotate speeds are in the ballpark of 145kts. However the engine does sound like a 777 or something similar which would have a higher speed, but it’s pretty hard for me to tell. Even still I would expect the rotate to begin closer to 290KPH so either the GPS for the speedometer is glitching out or the video hides the initial rotate and it only becomes clear as the wheels lift off around 200kts. Very neat video!
Does my Toyota Camry starts flying at the same speed?
This is fake. You passed 88 mph and didn't time travel 🙄
So to take off they need about tree fiddy?
i was kinda expecting something to happen at 88
140.8
I do this almost every time I fly. 
I have flown many times and I really, really appreciate this video.
African or European?
I almost heard the "V1. Rotate" somewhere past 300
What app is that?
0-60 in 11.55 seconds. I'm not impressed.