What are some amazing facts about airplanes?

 The colour on planes isn’t just for aesthetics, it's more aerodynamically efficient than darker colours because it saves 600-1,000 lbs of weight over darker paint, and every pound adds to operational costs;

It used to be that the "bathroom" on a plane had no smoking; however, in the event a person breaks the rule against smoking in the bathroom, it would be safer to have the cigarette butt in an ashtray as opposed to having a fire in a trash can. The world has come to accept that people will break the laws and prepare for it by making bathrooms on planes so

Those rods sticking out from the wings of a plane are not antennas; they are static discharge rods that allow planes to discharge excess electrical charges (static electricity) into the air. If a plane were to not have these static discharge rods installed it could cause interference with the radio up to and including the radio transmitting on the same frequency as your radio would cause you to get a buzzing sound and/or your radio would be fried from a lightning strike!

What about when all engines fail on a large jet? A Ram Air Turbine (RAT) is located on the bottom of most jets that allow the plane to glide even if all engines became inoperable; the RAT uses wind power to create enough power for all flight controls to safely land without using the engines.

The oxygen masks found on most large commercial jets give you approximately 15 minutes of oxygen; this isn't just because it's nice, it's because you'll be at 35,000 feet in the air and, upon loss of cabin pressure, it will take no more than 15 minutes to descend from that altitude to life-sustaining altitudes of 10,000 feet or less!

If there were to be a significant mechanical failure, jets have the ability to glide for great distances. For every 1 mile of elevation, a jet can glide anywhere from 15 - 20 miles forward. If you lose thrust in a large commercial jet, come see me for a physics lesson!

Why are wheels on airplanes so small compared to its body size?

 If it was possible to make an aircraft with no wheels, then they would. Wheels are a necessary evil. They only add weight and contribute nothing to the aircraft performance once off the ground. The undercarriage is used for the first 1% and the last 1% of the journey, and the fuel cost in carrying a heavier weight which is stowed for 98% of the journey is crazy.

When aircraft are using tires at any speed it's mostly for going straight, taking off or landing, so they don't need the wider tires that cars often need that are good for cornering. Airplanes rarely have to brake hard because pilots plan their landings such that they slow down both using aerodynamic drag and the runway lengths allow them to slow down without as much braking. Runways are flat and smooth, which means aircraft can get away with smaller tires compared to vehicles that must handle rough terrain.

On higher performance aircraft, when the landing gear retracts it's difficult to do with large wheels and tires. The wheels must fit into wheel wells when retracted after takeoff, and wheel wells take up space for cargo and fuel. Small wheels are lighter and fit in a smaller space, both good on an aircraft where space and weight are limited and carrying passengers for a profit is the goal. As the technology of brakes and rubber and metallurgy have advanced, so wheels have gotten smaller.

There is a type of aircraft designed to operate off of unimproved terrain that often uses very big tires. They use larger low pressure tires to handle the bumps and rocks that normal aircraft don't have to deal with. The early B-36 Peacemakers had a single huge mainwheel under each wing, and the Americans only had three airbases with surfaces strong enough to withstand the pressure that wheel was putting down. Production B-36s switched to multiple-wheel bogies and could land at many more airbases. Designers will shave off every last useless ounce that they can in the search for more efficiency, and for most aircraft operating on paved runways, smaller wheels do the job perfectly well.

What are some amazing facts about airplanes?

Here, are some amazing facts about airplanes:-

1. Pilots and co-pilots never eat the same meals when they are working. If something is wrong with the meal (like food poisoning), the other pilot will not be affected and can take over.

2. Planes are mostly painted white beacause:-

• It keeps the plane cool by reflecting sunlight.
• Unlike dark paints white doesn't fade plus it's cheaper.
• It offers a good visibility of cracks, leaking oil, corrosion & and suchlike on the ground.
• Colorful airplanes have low resale value

3.

• The world’s fastest airplane is the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird, flying at 58.83 km per minute(Mach 3.5).
• The SR-71 was so fast that it could simply outrun any missiles fired at it, racing out of the enemy's range in seconds.

4. Have you ever noticed those tiny holes on airplane windows, the reason why it’s there is because:-

• When an aircraft is at altitude,all the air in the aircraft basically wants to get outside to equalise the pressure with the outside pressure. The bleed hole acts as a safety feature which reduces the pressure on the middle of the 3 panes so only the outer pane takes the force of the cabin pressure more gradually.
• The also helps keep the window panes from fogging up.

5. One windshield or window frame of the Boeing 747-400's cockpit can cost as much as a brand new BMW car.

The whole plane costs well over $350 million.

6. The Concorde was the first supersonic passenger-carrying commercial airplane,it flew at up to mach 2.04.Concorde used to reach to 60,000ft.

So, passengers were able to see curvature of the Earth. Due to the intense heat of the airframe, an aircraft used to stretch anywhere from 6 to 10 inches during flight.

7. Increases in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are increasing the incidents of airplane turbulence.

8. The man named Michel Lotito ate an entire Cessna 150 airplane.

• It took him two years but he chewed through it.
• He didn’t just swallow it whole, he used utensils like a sledgehammer and acetylene torch.
• In 2007, Michel Lotito died at the age of 57, due to natural causes.

9.

• Mercury is not allowed on a flight. Even a small amount of mercury can seriously damage aluminum, which is what most planes are made from.
• Airplanes that are exposed to mercury are usually quarantined.

10.

Planes are engineered in such a way that allows them to withstand lightning strikes and keep passangers safe. It’s estimated lightning strikes each aircraft once a year. Yet, lightning hasn’t brought down a plane since 1963 due to careful engineering which lets the electric charge run through the plane without damaging it.

What are some amazing facts about airplanes?

 Welcome on Board ,here are some facts :

• Deadliest stealth plane – B-2 Spirit bomber – By no means the quickest, the B-2 Spirit could still drop 80 500lb guided bombs or 16 B83 nuclear bombs in a single pass, probably before anyone realized it was there.

• The Boeing 747 burns approximately one gallon of fuel every second. Over the course of a ten-hour flight, it may burn up to 36,000 gallons.

• The Russian Antonov AN-225 cargo jet is the largest plane in the world. It is nearly as big as a football field from nose to tail and wing tip to wing tip. It was originally built to transport a space plane. It has 6 engines.(If you need to fly something big -- like gargantuan oil industry equipment or a giant electric generator -- this is the plane you want.)

• The Sknyliv air show disaster occurred on 27 July 2002, when a Ukrainian Air Force Sukhoi Su-27 piloted by Volodymyr Toponar and co-piloted by Yuriy Yegorov crashed during an aerobatics presentation at Sknyliv airfield near Lviv, Ukraine. The accident killed 77 people and injured 543. 100 of those were hospitalised. It is the deadliest air show accident in history.

• A new aircraft today produces 70% less CO2 than its equivalent 50 years ago and 50% less noise than 20 years ago.
• You can fit 45 mid size automobiles on only one wing of a Boeing 747-400.
• A small airplane crashed in Africa, killing all but one of the passengers after a crocodile smuggled on board escaped and apparently caused a panic.

Note: Some of the points have been replaced.

Sources:

B-2 Spirit Stealth Bomber - Airforce Technology

Rare flight for biggest plane in the world

Sknyliv air show disaster - Wikipedia

Airliners.net - Aviation Forums

Plane Crashes... After Crocodile Escapes?