Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: learn vogel bomb here. Let's say you've just started the
Speaker 1: first leg of a flight and you're a little bit
Speaker 1: on edge because it was delayed. Are you going to
Speaker 1: miss your connection? But as you taxi to the runway,
Speaker 1: the pilot's voice booms over the intercom, giving you fresh hope.
Speaker 1: They say they may be able to make up lost
Speaker 1: time during the trip. But how on Earth or in
Speaker 1: the atmosphere do commercial airline pilots make up for lost
Speaker 1: time when a flight is running behind? Are they pressing
Speaker 1: extra hard on the accelerator. There are actually a number
Speaker 1: of ways that pilots can get you and your fellow
Speaker 1: passengers to your next stop ahead of schedule spoiler alert,
Speaker 1: and none of them involve weird sci fi wormholes or
Speaker 1: top gun reenactments. When pilots need to catch up on
Speaker 1: their schedules, they must first alert air traffic control regarding
Speaker 1: the situation. Air Traffic control, of course, provides guidance and
Speaker 1: direction for all flights to ensure maximum safety and efficiency,
Speaker 1: and without their go ahead, your pilot can't do anything
Speaker 1: to make the flight more expedious. But when air traffic
Speaker 1: control and pilots coordinate, they may find some wiggle room
Speaker 1: in the flight plan. That's because flight plans are rarely
Speaker 1: straight lines from point A to point B. Instead, there
Speaker 1: is a series of waypoints that guide the plane along
Speaker 1: to its destination. By omitting a waypoint or two, called
Speaker 1: direct routing, the pilot might be able to shave several
Speaker 1: minutes from a flight plan. For the article. This episode
Speaker 1: is based on How Stuff Works. Spoke via email with
Speaker 1: Jim Cox, a retired US Airways pilot who now operates
Speaker 1: an aviation safety consulting company called Safety Operating Systems. He
Speaker 1: explained that root adjustments are common in the industry. He
Speaker 1: explained air traffic control has preferred routing out of and
Speaker 1: into large cities. They require that routing be the filed
Speaker 1: flight plan routing. Depending on traffic, air traffic control may
Speaker 1: approve a request to shorten the flight path between navigation waypoints.
Speaker 1: This means that with shorter flights, there isn't much a
Speaker 1: pilot can do to save time. Longer flights are a
Speaker 1: better bet for pilots that need to make time up.
Speaker 1: In addition to the route itself, wind conditions greatly affect
Speaker 1: flight time A significant headwind blowing against the plane will
Speaker 1: slow the plane's overall speed. A tailwind pushing the plane
Speaker 1: can reduce flight time. If pilots can't avoid headwinds, they'll
Speaker 1: do their best to minimize its effects on the plane.
Speaker 1: Prevailing winds tend to blow from west to east in
Speaker 1: many parts of the world, so airlines tend to choose
Speaker 1: the most efficient routes given typical winds for the time
Speaker 1: of day or even by the season. On days when
Speaker 1: the prevailing winds veer in a different direction, the pilots
Speaker 1: may find that their flight time drops significantly compared with
Speaker 1: days or weeks earlier. So airline routes that go from
Speaker 1: west to east might allow a pilot to use the
Speaker 1: wind to save time, assuming whether conditions are favorable. You
Speaker 1: generally won't find wing conditions helping with north south roots.
Speaker 1: Though you might wonder why pilots don't simply increase the
Speaker 1: plane's speed to make up for time. That's because modern
Speaker 1: airliners are already built to fly at whatever the craft's
Speaker 1: optimum maximum speed is. Simply increasing the plane's speed would
Speaker 1: accomplish little in terms of time savings and burn a
Speaker 1: lot more of the airline's most precious and costly resource fuel.
Speaker 1: Even on very long flights, accelerating burns hundreds of extra
Speaker 1: pounds of fuel and saves at best only minutes on
Speaker 1: overall trip time. As you consider your schedule, keep in
Speaker 1: mind the airlines measure trip time using various terms, including
Speaker 1: flight time and block time. Block time includes things like
Speaker 1: taxiing and takeoff trips to and from. Busy airports like
Speaker 1: in Atlanta or New York City have more cushion built
Speaker 1: into their block time to give pilots a better chance
Speaker 1: of reaching their destinations on time. It's during your actual
Speaker 1: flight time, when the wheels aren't touching the ground, that
Speaker 1: your pilot may be able to cut a few corners
Speaker 1: and get you there more quickly. Also, we should note
Speaker 1: here that the airline industry isn't really built for changes
Speaker 1: to schedules, even if it seems like getting in early
Speaker 1: would generally be favorable. After all, there's a limited amount
Speaker 1: of airport infrastructure and workers available to process flights. For instance,
Speaker 1: if there are fifteen gates for disembarking passengers, a sixteenth
Speaker 1: plane that arrives early has nowhere to go. Similarly, ground
Speaker 1: crews can only handle so much luggage at once, meaning
Speaker 1: passengers might arrive ahead of schedule but then have nothing
Speaker 1: to do but pace around waiting at baggage claim. Interestingly,
Speaker 1: even though engine technologies have vastly improved, commercial airliners haven't
Speaker 1: gotten any faster since the nineteen sixties, and in many cases,
Speaker 1: modern planes are actually a little bit slower than their ancestors.
Speaker 1: It all boils down to engine efficiency, drag, and fuel costs.
Speaker 1: Airlines operate on exacting profit margins, and fuel is a
Speaker 1: major expense. Today's episode is based on the article how
Speaker 1: do pilots make up time in the air on how
Speaker 1: stuffworks dot com, written by Nathan Chandler. Brain Stuff is
Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio in partnership with how stuffworks dot Com
Speaker 1: and is produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts from
Speaker 1: my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.