From statista
"It is expected that 2020 will set a new record in terms of the number of scheduled passengers with over 4.72 billion, around 137 percent higher than in 2004."

Wanna bet?

I can't find how many different passengers fly each year.
In other words, how many repeats are there.
I'm guessing that way fewer than 1 billion, maybe even only 100 million make up all the individuals.

In other words again:
Is the total one guy flying 4.3 billion times or 4.3 billion people flying once?
The answer obviously is somewhere where in between. But where?

Two factoids I found (citations on request.)
"Maybe six percent of the world’s population flew in a single year."
“Less than 20 percent of the world's population has ever taken a single flight."

So of those 4 billion or so flights last year were taken by 420 million individuals.
And a little over one billion have ever flown

Intuitively, those seem too high. Corrections welcome.

I saw an unsubstantiated piece last night claiming less than 5% of the world population had never flown. I found that to be preposterous.

Never or ever?
I saw that mixed up in many of the sites I found.

I think it might be ever. I.E. 350 million people have done all the flying.

This confusion is why I asked the question in the first place.:)

No, it was definitely Never, and I just couldn't believe that. :headshake

Something to ponder...

Some more here...

LINK

Holy shit!
That is a whole multi-billion (trillion?) world I never heard of.
With climate change, pandemics and over-population, what a short-sighted way to waste resources.
Swords into plowshares? Nope, deadly toys.

War hero, no little war, the big one, WW II...

Somewhere up thread I mentioned the ability of the landing gear on the C5 Galaxy and the B-52 to align itself with the runway centre line as the aircraft 'crabs' down the approach for a cross wind landing.

It's a useful capability during a cross wind takeoff as well.



For those possessed of an enquiring mind, try carrying a large sheet of plywood in a high wind. ;)

I didn't know they could do that. Makes sense to have the wings into the wind for max lift.

I had a look at the Haynes Manual for the B-52 on Amazon.

It's extremely expensive, so I won't be shelling out, but I was interested to see a description of the landing gear offset mechanism in one of the images of the book.

Click here, go to image number six and embiggen.

I was surprised to see that it is a manually selected system. I expected it to be somehow connected to the Instrument Landing System (ILS) extended centre line beam, the localiser.

Admittedly, that might not be at the top of the list of available facilities when the aircraft is operated in a wartime environment, so perhaps it shouldn't come as too much of a surprise after all.

With 5 of the 6 crew up front, someone ought to be able to do the manual thing.
Amazing planes, too bad what they do.

From Wikipedia:
"Because of the B-52's mission parameters, only modest maneuvers would be required with no need for spin recovery.[96] The aircraft has a relatively small, narrow chord rudder, giving it limited yaw control authority. Originally an all-moving vertical stabilizer was to be used, but was abandoned because of doubts about hydraulic actuator reliability.[96] Because the aircraft has eight engines, asymmetrical thrust due to the loss of an engine in flight would be minimal and correctable with the narrow rudder. To assist with crosswind takeoffs and landings the main landing gear can be pivoted 20 degrees to either side from neutral.[97] This yaw adjustable crosswind landing gear would be preset by the crew according to wind observations made on the ground."

so they line up the wheels with the windsock and then land, eh?

Not quite. The aircraft is pointed into wind and the wheels are aligned with the centre line of the runway.

The plane will align itself with the wind, just line up the wheels with the runway.

Hey, wait a damn minute, a Haynes Manual? For our main strategic bomber? Isn't that treason or something?

Like!

A flying gun.
In Vietnam we had all the air power, close support would make your day and dust-offs save your life.
We never would have won without them.

More:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXgtyyXjDm4

I see what you did there.

Cluster fuck...

Russian planes...

Vapor trails, that's how they spread the virus to the 5G towers.

I call it a mullet plane, propeller in the front, jet in the rear...

Shiny high wing over Phoenix Sky Harbor...

I am having trouble identifying objects in the pic.
This does not seem to help:
https://www.skytamer.com/6.1/AZ/Phoenix,SkyHarbor.jpg

Seems to be a lack of airplanes.

Attachment 70866

This is a screen grab from Google Earth.
It's a bit of a compromise as far as vertical angle v area covered is concerned.
Compare the unlit area to the LHS with the rather low river in this daylight image.
Lack of aircraft visible can probably be explained by it being very late at night when movements are few and far between and a transiting aircraft can get permission to cross approaches or departure routes.

nice work xoB.

Can you tell me about the difference in the colors of the lights? I reckon the orange ones are sodium vapor, the white ones are probably leds or mercury vapor, I guess... but why different colors in different areas?

Sorry to be dense, but how about what functions are done where.
Things like runways, taxiways, ramps, terminals and hangars.

You can't see the runways?

OK, runways, parallel, no cross winds.
Big ponds on both sides of both.

Ponds? No ponds. I think you're losing perspective on the size. That overhead photo you linked has plenty of planes but they are tiny.
The North runway is 11,489 feet long(2 fucking miles) and 150 feet wide.
The middle runway is 10,300 feet long and 150 feet wide.
The south runway is 7,800 feet long and 150 feet wide.
All three have black rubber streaks up the middle.
All three have a bunch of concrete loops on the side for taxi.
The loops have something dark in the middle, dirt, blacktop, whatever.

When you absolutely positively have to get your glider off the ground...

A bot-tailed Rolls w/a ball hitch, I'll be dipped.

They built one, made a short test flight, crashed on it's second flight, gave it up as too expensive...

That is one hell of a plane. Its engines are works of art.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caproni_Ca.60

It is surprising how little known the Caproni aircraft saga is.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caproni

We've paid for the use of the runway so we're going to have our money's worth...



Rada Airlines (Belarus) IL-62 freighter departing Nis, Serbia.

He raised dust off the plowed field a 1/4 mile from the pavement.
Not welcome back.

Tons of original engineering drawings for the P-51.

Attachment 71114

When the factory gave them to the current owner in 1988 a lot of the were wet from a broken pipe and had to be dried out.
Fortunately most were vellum with graphite pencil drawings and sketches which handle water pretty well.

These are rare because most manufacturers transferred everything to microfilm and destroyed the originals in order to save space.
Unfortunately for some reason microfilm has trouble with vellum.

Attachment 71115

Digital doesn't have this problem.

Carb , I assume, of the wonderful Merlin engine.
I love the "emerg. f. rich" and what it must have done.

That position was safety wired off but with a wire weak enough to break with a determined force of the control.
The instructions were if you need this return to base immediately.

♫ It's fun to fly the BOAC
It's fun to fly the BOAC
They’ve things for young men to enjoy
You can hang out with all the boys
♫It's fun to fly the BOAC
It's fun to fly the BOAC
You can get yourself clean,
you can have a good meal
♫You can do whatever you feel

The VC-10 didn't need the .50 on NY flights.

What's that in English?

See 1771-1774 in Random Pics.

I wonder if these skis would help in a forced water landing, Sully might have made it to shore. ;)

At first, I thought "Prolly couldn't hurt.", but, I guess they might dig in. That wouldn't be good.

I thought they might decelerate the plane a little before the fuselage hit the water.

This is apparently on again in Florida...

I didn't notice it at first, but the landing Su-27 slightly undershoots and straddles the barrier in the central reservation before completing the landing. :eek:

Heh, catching that guardrail would have been embarrassing. :rolleyes:

Blast from the past...

You can own the only flying F-82...

Attachment 71335

or for a few dollars more...

Attachment 71336