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Comment by barnaclejive | Hacker News Reader

Why is everyone arguing about stuff in this thread instead of focusing on the less-interesting but still super concerning fact that something flew "right over the top" of a commercial airplane? Even in the least-interesting case of it probably a US test thing of some kind - wtf is it doing flying in commercial airspace? Can you imagine if it had hit the plane?

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Probably because "right over the top" can be a 2D descriptor of 3D space. We therefore have no idea how close this object was to the plane. It is entirely possible it was directly above the plane but high enough that it actually wasn't in commercial airspace.

There is no such thing as "commercial airspace." I think you're confusing Class A with commercial, as that's primarily where commercial airliners fly, but there's nothing saying that military operations can't happen there too, so long as they are IFR

I was simply using the terminology OP was using and explaining why "right over the top" doesn't mean there was potential for collision.

Yeah, that’s my question. I’ll assume someone (whether the US government, Elon Musk, or whoever) was testing a rocket of some sort. Why the hell was it in the same area as a commercial flight? I’ll add another stupid human error to my list of things to be afraid of while on a plane.

Elon Musk actually commented that he had no idea of this thing's existence on Joe Rogan's podcast

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