A world without planes | Hacker News Reader

A world without planes

news.bbc.co.uk

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The travel times are unduly pessamistic. Australia is an edge case - the reason that travelling London to Australia takes so long is largely due to poor overland connections after you reach southeast Asia. You can travel by train from London to e.g. Beijing in around 10-11 days.

London to Rome can be done comfortably and cheaply by train in under 24 hours. Some people prefer this to flying.

The website seat61.com has a huge amount of info on travelling internationally by rail.

Also I suspect rail travel would suddenly recieve a lot of investment should air travel become impossible.

Yes, in a true plane-free world you'd probably get from London to Sydney by taking a train to Shanghai or Bangkok or something and then catching a ship to take you the rest of the way.

Or with a bit of high-speed rail development, get a train to India, a boat across the Indian Ocean to Perth, and then a two-day high-speed train across Australia.

This actually sounds like fun the first time, but if you had to do it regularly you'd be missing the 23 hour plane ride pretty quick.

Travel itself should be quite ok even regularly, it certainly wouldn't be just siting in your seat for 2 days and looking out of the window, more like a hotel on rails. But I'd very afraid of bureaucracy: entry visa, transit visa, various railway companies and their mess of various offers and discounts… Land trip across Asia means passing through countries like Iran, China or Russia. And given how unkind seems rail travel even within EU's borders (where only the last problems applies, and you can get all schedule informations you need by just typing your destination at http://oebb.at or similar site) for many people, and not because the length of the trip.

On the other hand, it would be wonderful business opportunity for travel agencies. And much more interesting than just booking the right plane. I almost want it to happen :-)

Last December I flew SFO to Buenos Aires to SFO to Sydney to SFO in the space of a month. If I'd done that via land and sea I would have spent the whole month on a vehicle. (Actually it kinda felt that way anyway).

It's fine to trave by train if it takes less than 12 hours. otherwise, flights 12h*300KMpH = 3600 KM. it's almost the whole EU

Very eloquent.

The thing that has surprised me with all these Airplane groundings is the number of companies who say they could go out of business. One of the smaller firms has said they will be effectively bankrupt if they can't start flying on Monday. I just heard Easyjet on the radio saying they need to fly at least 2 weeks in the next month to avoid "financial instability".

I know the aviation industry is struggling but didn't realise they were that close to the wire.

It's not only airlines that would be affected. Think about UPS and FedEx. Think about major exporters of fresh fruits, fish, etc. Most of those are transported by planes. The "build on demand" model that companies like Dell operate under would also have to go, and non-on demand retailers would have to maintain considerably higher stocks due to higher lead times. US - European business relations would be severely hurt.

And how is that NOT a good thing? Nice way of mother Nature getting back at our global economy by 'internalizing' those pesky economic externalities like pollution.

That doesn't even make the slightest bit of sense. You think damaging the global economy is a good thing? How would you feel if you got laid off because of this mess and couldn't find another job? And a volcano isn't an externality, because humans aren't responsible for it.

I hope we don't have a disaster because aviation authorities were pressured into opening the skies too early.

That's what's concerning me too.

It's partly ironic; I expect if there had been a terror attack grounded planes would be accepted, but people on the news last night seemed actually cross this was affecting them....

One guy even said (and I swear this is a quote): "but it looks clear out there, it's not at ground level is it?"

doh.

This reminds me of an old joke:

An airplane was flying from LA to New York. About an hour into the flight, the pilot announced, "We have lost an engine, but don't worry, there are three left. However, instead of 5 hours it will take 7 hours to get to New York."

A little later, the pilot announced, "A second engine failed, but we still have two left. However, it will take 10 hours to get to New York."

Somewhat later, the pilot again came on the intercom and announced, "A third engine had died. Never fear, because the plane can fly on a single engine. However, it will now take 18 hours to get to new York."

At this point, one passenger said, "Gee, I hope we don't lose that last engine, or we'll be up here forever!"

Most laypeople do think it's a problem with visibility and can't understand why if planes can fly at night they can't fly through dust. That it will destroy the engines (and won't show up on radar, so you can't just avoid it) never occurs to them. I suppose it's nice to live in a world in which flight is taken for granted.

With all the media attention you would think the dangers of flying in this would have been clearly explained to everyone by now.

BBC One had a fantastic news report the other night that explained it really clearly. I was impressed.

NPR also had a segment explaining it.

There's an Air Crash Investigation episode about flying through vulcano dust. Show them and they'll understand.

This one?

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5620835202130688048

I have to say that I have not seen much evidence of people not being aware of what is going on in general terms, or challenging the groundings.

Upset, sure, but (for once) pretty much upset at the right target: ms. Nature.

>ms. Nature.

Dang, if only God hadn't been running MS Nature we'd have been saved all this kerfuffle!

"pressured into opening the skies too early"

It's not just their own regulations they'd have to break, it would be the terms of sale of the aircraft (Boeing sayeth "thou shalt not fly the big shiny bird through clouds of volcanic ash") and their insurers, who say much the same thing.

There's only one rule that matters, what a man's insured for, and what he's not.

I read somewhere that our understanding of flying in/near clouds of volcanic ash is quite limited. We know from the BA9 Jakarta incident what an almost worst-case scenario looks like, but little more. The necessity to study it was simply not there - eruptions to far has happened in areas with fairly light traffic, so shutting down affected airspace had low consequences.

If this eruption is going to last more than a few days more, keeping some of the worlds most busy hubs offline, there will be serious effort put into making flying under these conditions safe. An obvious part of the solution could be radars or lidars that can reliably see where this stuff is, and how dense, so flights can avoid it. Another could be coating for windows that can withstand the "sandblasting".

> Another could be coating for windows that can withstand the "sandblasting".

AFAIK it's not just the windows that are the problem. The volcanic ash can melt in the heat of the engine and essentially turn to glass, taking the engines out. Sounds nasty to fly through in every way.

Indeed, like I say, most people don't realize the problem is the engines.

Also aviation radars see clouds by the moisture in them - they can't see ash because it's dry.

A better solution would be to do what the Soviet Union did when that neuclear plant blew up: drop chemicals from the sky to force it to rain in place nobody cares much about.

This time, we could dump that stuff out over the Atlantic.

I'm pretty sure the problem is that the volcano keeps belching this stuff out. Once it stops, it should disperse relatively quickly.

This won't work -- the ashcloud is currently above any significant amounts of water in the air. You can't make rain from dry air.

What are the costs for companies with grounded planes? I guess most of the cheap lines don't have to refund - only to rebook. There would be the cost of keeping the planes in the airport hangars of course, but I would imagine that at some point airports will charge only some discount rate if this condition continues (it's probably more profitable in a long run than making some company bankrupt... or is it?) Are there any other costs?

Also, what about bailouts? We had money for banks - why wouldn't we sponsor grounded planes?

Pretty close to the costs for companies with flying planes, I would think: salaries, depreciation/leasing of planes and real estate, airport fees, insurance, power, etc. They do save on fuel costs, I guess.

The airline industry was bailed out in 2001 and probably will be again if this goes on. I believe an economist showed that the industry as a whole (since it started) has lost money.

Sorry - I was thinking about costs different to what they normally pay. So you're right - it's almost exactly what they pay anyways. But if you manage to actually have a number of planes flying internationally, I'd imagine you should have enough money in reserve to support the company for a month without much income (also, people are still buying tickets for the following months). It was not even a week so far - that's probably comparable to the number of flights stopped every year because of snow. Should I seriously believe that they don't plan for those kinds of events?

In general, Aviation is 0-profit biz. And alot of Sturt-ups and other businneses are dependent of cheap flights.

What are you talking about? Just because the airlines aren't doing great right now does NOT mean aviation is a 0 profit biz...

I think it was in the notes to a recent re-print of The Intelligent Investor or Security Analysis but it made clear that the cumulative profit of the airline industry has been negative overall (I'll try and find the reference to back it up). Of course there are some airlines that make money, but a lot that don't. Think of British Airways: essentially a loss-making pension fund with an airline on the side.

Bottom of p.7, 4th edition with preface by Warren Buffett. But note the full quote:'It is commonly accepted today that the cumulative earnings of the airline industry over its entire history have been negative. The lesson Graham is driving at is not that you should avoid buying airline stocks, but that you should never succumb to the "certainty" that any industry will outperform all others in the future.'

cummulitive profit of whole industry is 0. some people makes alot of money, but not companies.

I suspect that's much like Hollywood, i.e. why if you're an actor you want a gross point (a share of the revenue) and not a net point (a share of the profit, which on paper won't exist, for tax purposes).

Because the companies are poorly run. This has little to do with the industry itself and air travel is clearly not going to stop anytime soon. Some companies may die, but again aviation is not a 0 profit industry, these are just shitty companies who grew beyond what they could manage.

Some airlines are profitable, Southwestern, Ryanair, Easyjet, Westjet - but this is offset by national airlines which aren't.

US airlines are never profitable because the more money they lose apparently the more willing people are to bail them out

Flights were grounded en masse at the turn of millennium and the bizarre quiet of the skies over the San Francisco Peninsula gave me a sort of surreal feeling that made me think, contrary to the elegiac vision of the author of this piece, "what would it have been like to have been born, lived, and died without planes, electricity, running water, and other modern conveniences and probably fallen victim to some pestilent disease by the time I was 30, just like my great-great-great grandparents did back in the villages of Greece from which they never traveled more than 25 miles during their entire lifetimes?"

It made me kind of shudder to think that this had been the lot of most of humanity throughout all the centuries and made me grateful for what we have today.

Nicely written piece, though.

The piece definitely has a quaint naivete to it.

Thinking that it's somehow the things we build which are ruining our lives rather than we creators and our priorities in building them.

> The wise elders would explain that inside the aircraft, passengers, who had only paid the price of a few books for the privilege, would impatiently and ungratefully shut their window blinds to the views, would sit in silence next to strangers while watching films about love and friendship - and would complain that the food in miniature plastic beakers before them was not quite as tasty as the sort they could prepare in their own kitchens.

That seems arrogant and ungrateful, but he left out that airplanes tortured 4 senses and merely teased the 5th. They did not in anyway make you feel human.

But they let you FLY through the AIR. Seriously - it's pretty awesome.

Alain de Botton is a beautiful writer... if you liked this, you'll love "A week at the airport," a whole book full of this kind of stuff from Heathrow Airport. (Currently not available in US, but you can order from Amazon UK with your US account).

Time to bring back the Zeppelin.

Yay! That would be a boon for my local economic region (Bodensee, home of the Zeppelin!)

I'm pleased he thinks that bees will survive.

Assuming that the ash layer remains at altitudes over 32,000 ft., would not airlines eventually start flying at lower altitudes, albeit slower, with more stopovers, and more costly?

IT is possible. but it will be twice slower and twice more expensive ... but yes.

High speed rail; high speed ships.

Once humanity is hooked on the fast, easy travel, I'm not convinced there's going back.

(Of course, trains still make noise and there are those who think rail lines are ugly, to say nothing of the seas of asphalt. We aren't going back to nature anytime soon.)

That fact that you think air travel fails to qualify as fast or easy shows how spoiled we are and is kind of humorous.

No, I think it does qualify as fast, at least as far as actual travel is concerned (let's not go into on the ground procedures right now). I meant that high speed rail and ships would soon be created and improved if we really didn't have the airspace anymore.

I don't think you realize just how fast planes are compared to ships. A decent speed for a ship is 20kts. An airliner routinely makes 500kts. Hours become days and days become weeks. Everyone's world becomes a lot smaller unless you want to spend your entire vacation traveling.

I actually do realize that.

(Nitpick: the 747-400, "among the fastest airliners in service", has a cruise speed of 913 km/h or 493 knots, so I'd dispute the "routinely" -- but your point definitely stands.)

That's why I made it a point to include the "created and improved". Right now, it's much easier to barrel through low-resistance air. A ship twice or three times as fast as your average passenger ship will still be an inferior choice to an airplane on most (probably not all, but definitely most) routes. There is therefore little incentive to try to improve ships. In most cases, it's just not going to pay. The situation is similar for rail travel on longer routes: there's little money in making the Trans-Siberian go faster.

If we can no longer barrel through air, whether worldwide or on a selection of routes (European airports to Keflavík, for instance), suddenly making the ship or the train go twice as fast is much, much more appealing. Return on investment is much better, so investment is going to pick up.

The current airplane speeds actually help this argument. Once people are used to trips taking days, not weeks, convincing them to pay premium for something that feeds the speed addiction is easier.

I don't know what the technology will be, or how far it will go. It's very likely that it won't go as fast as airplanes. But already, with the limited reward, we have passengers ships that go over 40 knots (HSC Manannan). If I had to guess, catamarans, hovercraft-like, and ekranoplan-like technologies might play a role, but I really don't know where we'll end up. It will undoubtedly be difficult, but engineers don't roll over just because water is more viscous.

Similarly, conventional high-speed rail exceeded 300 knots in test runs. There's probably room to go up, but little reward for investment because right now you still have to compete with 400-500 knot airplanes. Once you don't, and people are willing to pay for any extra speed... who knows what will happen.

(Can you tell I'm an idealistic engineering student?)

Boeing is quoting speed through the air there. With a tailwind ground speed will be higher - and airlines plot their courses to take advantage of it wherever possible (e.g. the jetstream). That's why I say "routinely".

One of the reasons the Dutch are so eager to fly again is they are the world centre of the flower business - but only if they have air freight.

Fair enough.

Very relevant Louis CK standup bit: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk&feature=playe...

Here's a better link to that same clip: http://barefootmeg.multiply.com/video/item/56

Everything I've read talks about the potential for damage to jet engines. Does that extend to turbo-prop engines ?

I know they fly slower, but in a real emergency, could smaller cargo aircraft (e.g. C-130) still fly ?

Turbo-prop is in the same danger (TURBO means they use turbine) Piston engines looks to be in safter zone. And prolly we can use it.

Piston engines are just as vulnerable, the only difference being that the failure mode (scouring versus glassing) is slower, so there's a somewhat better chance of survival.

As for the original question, current commercial and military cargo aircraft don't use "jet" engines anymore, they use turbofans, where the vast majority of the thrust comes from a ducted fan at the front of the engine rather than from heated and accelerated exhaust gas. The main differences between turboprop and turbofan configurations are (1) the duct, which allows far more efficient high-speed airflow at the expense of low-speed (near-static) thrust, and (2) the variable pitch and "eddy wall" (in which the turbulence of the propeller wash creates a virtual surface behind the propeller, allowing greater pressure to build up) of the propeller (as opposed to a fan), which provide a huge advantage in short takeoff and landing.

One thing for sure, even though the ash is probably not good for the environment itself, having a severe cut down on aircraft flights is good for nature.

Natural Ash is good for the ground, and especially for vineyards

So, Prolly we will have alot of good wine this year ;-)

Not this year. Maybe in a couple.

When all aircraft were grounded over the USA after 9-11, the temperature over the USA spiked 1.1 degrees above expected. It then fell back when flights resumed.

It turns out that the contrails left by aircraft bounce some of the solar radiation back into space before it reaches the ground, which stops it being converted into infra-red and being trapped in the atmosphere.

So if global aviation ceased entirely, it would help global warming along quite a bit. Of course, the emissions would be gone, but their effect is long-term...

Whoa there. Contrails do bounce a lot of radiation back in the short term, but you haven’t showed that they balance the greenhousing effect of the exhaust gasses over the long term.

There's a difference between climate and temperature.

Got a source on that? Any strong evidence that it was a true temperature spike due to that effect rather than... y'know, the usual week-to-week fluctuations of weather?

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/08/07/contrails.cl...

It has nothing to do with global warming, but it's a true story.

You're forgetting about all the radiation being reflected by the volcanic ash in the upper atmosphere around most of northwestern Europe.

It depends. The volcanic ash might be dark enough to - on balance - absorb heat, like the brown cloud over Southern Asia does. I'm not aware of work that's been done on that.

However, good point - hadn't thought of that. Maybe Gaia is swatting planes. :D

Aeroplanes are part of nature too, y'know.

Is that really for sure? Why?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_and_the_environment

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcano#Effects_of_volcanoes

http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/2010/planes-or-volcano...

(graphic if the full page won't load: http://s3.amazonaws.com/infobeautiful/planes_volcanos.png)

Very simplistic to just look at CO2. And how do you define what is good for nature?

This is how it ends, not with a bang but with a whimper.

I think the volcano itself makes more of a "bang" sound. :)

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