Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology with
Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello, everyone,
Speaker 1: welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Polette and
Speaker 1: I am an editor here and how stuff works dot Com.
Speaker 1: Sitting across from me, as he always does, is senior
Speaker 1: writer Jonathan Strickland. Hey there, so, uh you know we
Speaker 1: were looking at for podcast topics too hard. Well, no,
Speaker 1: that's true, but for a while we were kind of
Speaker 1: up in the air on this one. Yeah, but fortunately
Speaker 1: a listener managed to uh to to get us on
Speaker 1: target targets. So let's go to a little listener mail.
Speaker 1: This listener mail comes from Paul, and Paul says, Hi,
Speaker 1: John and Chris, I enjoy your podcasts and those of
Speaker 1: your associates and How stuff Works very much. I thought
Speaker 1: this might make an intra sting topic, the technology behind
Speaker 1: air traffic control. I was told that at one time,
Speaker 1: and perhaps this is still true, that the US is
Speaker 1: using very old computer technology for air traffic control and
Speaker 1: that plans to upgrade the system have been bogged down
Speaker 1: for decades. But appreciate your insight into this. Thank you.
Speaker 1: So much for keeping me entertained over long hours in
Speaker 1: my car. Paul. Alright, Paul, Well, we're gonna talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about air traffic control and what goes into
Speaker 1: keeping everybody safe up in the skies and uh, well,
Speaker 1: to talk about the old technologies. It's true that a
Speaker 1: lot of the technology used in air traffic control has
Speaker 1: been around for for a while. Um, there are plans
Speaker 1: to eventually automate the system, but that still not here yet. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know why he'd be concerned about that. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's not like fifty thou planes are in the air
Speaker 1: every day over the United States. Wait, oh wait, yes
Speaker 1: they are on a good day. Um. Yeah. The the
Speaker 1: automated thing, well, I'll go ahead and get this all
Speaker 1: the way first. One of the there's several reasons why
Speaker 1: it would take a while to move to a fully
Speaker 1: automated system. One is that while you're upgrading to the
Speaker 1: fully automated system, the existing system would have to continue
Speaker 1: to operate. Because it's not like we can just say,
Speaker 1: you know what, we're gonna take a i don't know
Speaker 1: six months and not fly all right, you guys look
Speaker 1: out for yourselves out there. Well yeah, we're gonna paint
Speaker 1: all the planes a bright day glow pink or green
Speaker 1: and uh and yeah, good best of luck. Now that
Speaker 1: that's not the way it's gonna that's not the way
Speaker 1: it can work. So obviously, if you're going to to
Speaker 1: upgrade a system as huge as the air traffic control
Speaker 1: system is, and we'll get into how big it is
Speaker 1: in a minute, um, then it's gonna take a lot
Speaker 1: of time, and you're gonna have to you're gonna have
Speaker 1: to duplicate systems uh while you are ready getting ready
Speaker 1: to switch over to the other side. And then if
Speaker 1: there's an element that requires airplanes to also get upgrade,
Speaker 1: it's that's an entirely different issue because now you're talking
Speaker 1: about two totally different multiple systems really, because you've got
Speaker 1: the government system, which would be the air traffic control
Speaker 1: because that's overseen by the f A A, right, so
Speaker 1: that's a government agency. And then you have all the
Speaker 1: private companies that are the you know, the private airlines,
Speaker 1: not to mention private pilots and uh, and you know,
Speaker 1: to upgrade their equipment. That also is going to take
Speaker 1: a really long time. So it's it's one of those
Speaker 1: where the the the job is very complex, it's huge,
Speaker 1: and it's the government. I think if you talk about
Speaker 1: huge complex and government, you you realize that means lots
Speaker 1: of time is going to go by before it ever happens. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but that's not because you know, people just don't want
Speaker 1: to do it. It's it's complex, so right, and it's expensive,
Speaker 1: it's you know, and again this money comes from taxes.
Speaker 1: Turns out people aren't thrilled about paying taxes, so anything
Speaker 1: that requires tax money it ends up being a clitical battle.
Speaker 1: So I mean, the complex, like we said, goes well
Speaker 1: beyond just the technology. But now that we've covered that,
Speaker 1: let's talk a little bit about what is involved in
Speaker 1: the air traffic control system. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: speaking of complex, the air air traffic control system itself
Speaker 1: is very complex and this probably will give you a
Speaker 1: better idea too, in the types of technology we're talking about.
Speaker 1: Um As it turns out the h the air traffic
Speaker 1: control space is divided up really in three dimensions, which
Speaker 1: is appropriate, but it's kind of it's kind of weird
Speaker 1: to think about when you're not I guess, when you're
Speaker 1: not thinking about how air traffic control works on a
Speaker 1: data right basis, because um the United States is divided
Speaker 1: up geographically into twenty one different zones also known as centers,
Speaker 1: and each of those zones is divided into sectors. While
Speaker 1: those are two dimensions, uh you know, the with the
Speaker 1: United States and the length, and then you have the
Speaker 1: altitudes in those zones, and they're are different groups of
Speaker 1: people who are managing aircraft as they move from one
Speaker 1: zone to the next. Um So, which is kind of
Speaker 1: weird to think, like I said, and it's kind of
Speaker 1: weird to think about it because you're thinking, Okay, well
Speaker 1: I got it. You know, you're flying from say, Dallas
Speaker 1: to Chicago. You know, you say in Dallas, hey I'm
Speaker 1: going to Chicago, and Chicago says, okay, well come on,
Speaker 1: we're ready for you. That's not really that simple, right,
Speaker 1: it's you know, from from a passenger experience, what it
Speaker 1: seems like to us is that you have when I
Speaker 1: don't know about you, Chris, but when I think air
Speaker 1: traffic control, I'm thinking of the towers at the airport, right,
Speaker 1: So you're the only part of it, yeah, exactly. But
Speaker 1: you're at the airport, you see the air traffic control tower.
Speaker 1: You know that the pilot is talking to air traffic
Speaker 1: control and saying, hey, I got a bunch of people here.
Speaker 1: They want to get off the ground, and air traffic
Speaker 1: control is like, well, we're gonna make them wait around
Speaker 1: a while because we're jerks. And then the pilot says,
Speaker 1: but we're the ones who get all the blame, and
Speaker 1: the air traffic control says ha ha ha, And then
Speaker 1: actually that's probably not how it works. But at any rate,
Speaker 1: the pilot contacts air traffic control, they get the clearance
Speaker 1: to take off, and then you're in flight, and then
Speaker 1: you you pretty much don't really think about air traffic
Speaker 1: control as a passenger until you get close to landing.
Speaker 1: So you're thinking of the starting point in the endpoint,
Speaker 1: uh as like the air traffic air traffic control tower
Speaker 1: in both airports. Turns out there actually several stations along
Speaker 1: the way that UM monitor your flight for the entire
Speaker 1: duration of the flight. UM. Now, the the tower that
Speaker 1: you're talking about, Jonathan, is the air traffic control tower
Speaker 1: a t c T. And that's you can find one
Speaker 1: of those that basically any airport that has regularly scheduled
Speaker 1: flights and they you know, managed to take off and
Speaker 1: landing in the ground traffic to make sure that they
Speaker 1: know what's going on. But once the plane well, okay,
Speaker 1: we'll talk about the other parts. Um. The other parts
Speaker 1: are the Air Traffic Control System Command Center a t
Speaker 1: C s c C, and that's uh basically that's in
Speaker 1: charge of all air traffic can roll UM you know
Speaker 1: we're talking about. They manage things, you know, routing traffic
Speaker 1: and bad weather and and trying to figure out what's
Speaker 1: going on with the UH UM traffic patterns and how
Speaker 1: the runways are dealing with on the ground. But um,
Speaker 1: locally you have Air Route Traffic Control Centers a r
Speaker 1: t c C s UM. Each center has its own
Speaker 1: r t c C and they manage traffic within the
Speaker 1: sectors UH in that area except for the next group
Speaker 1: the tray con terminal Radar Approach Control and they handle
Speaker 1: the departing and approaching aircraft within that space that they
Speaker 1: are assigned. And that space is around fifteen miles and radius.
Speaker 1: So UM. Yeah, So what we're doing is we're going
Speaker 1: from very large and getting progressively smaller here, right. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So we've got the center, which is the big one.
Speaker 1: You've got the you know, the air Route Traffic Control
Speaker 1: Centers which that controls a zone or that's what we
Speaker 1: you know, the center slash zone, however you want to
Speaker 1: call it. So there are multiple sectors within that. Then
Speaker 1: you've got the tray con, which can actually overlap sectors
Speaker 1: depending on where it is geographically. But um, it's got
Speaker 1: the fifty mile radius. And then what's next after that? Um? Wait,
Speaker 1: after the traycon? Yeah, I guess the tracon is technically
Speaker 1: the air traffic control tower because at that point you're
Speaker 1: dealing with the airspace around the airport itself. And then
Speaker 1: there's you know, the flight service station. So if you
Speaker 1: need information about whether or the route or flight plan
Speaker 1: for private pilots, um, then you would consult with the
Speaker 1: flight service station. But those are in smaller, smaller areas,
Speaker 1: and there are people like rural rural airports I'm sorry, yes, um.
Speaker 1: And you know, in the case of emergencies and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, if there are search and rescue operations that
Speaker 1: need to be managed for a missing or overdo aircraft,
Speaker 1: the flight service station us involved with that. But um, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean small small aircraft that are lying by vision
Speaker 1: only visual flight rules. Um. You know, they don't really
Speaker 1: they're not required by the f A to file a
Speaker 1: flight plan. Um. So the mainstream traffic control centers don't
Speaker 1: deal with these smaller aircraft, right. They they have specific
Speaker 1: rules they have to follow which prevent them from getting
Speaker 1: within the same sort of flight space as the massive
Speaker 1: larger aircraft. But as long as they are following the rules,
Speaker 1: than they don't have to to do a flight plan.
Speaker 1: They don't have to check in as often as the
Speaker 1: commercial flights do. Um. The ones that are the big boys,
Speaker 1: like the commercial flights, Uh, they do. They follow the
Speaker 1: instrument flight rules, right, which means they can fly in
Speaker 1: all kinds of weather because they're they're using instruments to
Speaker 1: guide them. Uh. Not just it's not just you know,
Speaker 1: oh I can I I have good uh visibility. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's like I could see where I'm going going right,
Speaker 1: that's part of it, right. Um And uh all I
Speaker 1: f R flight rule pilots, Um, that was redundant. Thanks
Speaker 1: um My file a flight plan within thirty minutes of
Speaker 1: pushing back from the gate. Basically, what you don't see
Speaker 1: the pilot doing is checking the weather, making sure that
Speaker 1: the route is okay, and filing a flight plan. And
Speaker 1: that's got all the information in it that the air
Speaker 1: traffic control folks are gonna need to know like the name,
Speaker 1: flight number of the air the airline, the type of
Speaker 1: aircraft they're flying in, the equipment on board, the intended
Speaker 1: air speed and cruising altitude, and the route of the
Speaker 1: flight right and this is of course, all this information
Speaker 1: is necessary for air traffic control to make sure that
Speaker 1: there are aren't any uh there's not gonna be any
Speaker 1: real congestion in the flight space about the United States,
Speaker 1: not that kind of congestion, but to make sure that
Speaker 1: you're not gonna have any potentially dangerous situations due to
Speaker 1: too many aircraft occupying the same space at approximately the
Speaker 1: same time. So that's why all these flight plans have
Speaker 1: to be filed. It's uh, it's really to give air
Speaker 1: traffic control the the big picture look at what is
Speaker 1: going on at any given time above the United States airspace.
Speaker 1: Should I go on? Please do? In the tower, We've
Speaker 1: got a flight data person who's checking the weather and
Speaker 1: flight plane information, um and then put it into the
Speaker 1: f a a host computer and UM the computer comes
Speaker 1: up with a flight progress strip that goes from the
Speaker 1: controllers to you know, to the flight from different station
Speaker 1: to station. Uh. So that it's possible to track a
Speaker 1: particular plane, right, So as a plane travels from one
Speaker 1: zone into another, the controllers for those zones have to
Speaker 1: be able to pass the information along to the next
Speaker 1: controller so that everything remains up to date and everyone
Speaker 1: knows where everybody is. Uh. So it turns out that's important, right.
Speaker 1: So for for a flight from one coast to the other,
Speaker 1: you will cross through several zones, so many different controllers
Speaker 1: will have their hands on that on your flight's information
Speaker 1: as you go from one side to the other. So
Speaker 1: let's say like Atlanta to l A. I'll be taking
Speaker 1: that flight in June. So as I'm taking that flight,
Speaker 1: you're I'm going to you know that that flight's information
Speaker 1: is going to pass through not just the local air
Speaker 1: traffic control uh team that's that's there at the Atlanta Airport,
Speaker 1: but through many different centers as we fly across the country.
Speaker 1: That's right. Um, I mean the ground controller is managing
Speaker 1: the ground traffic, the traffic you know what's going on
Speaker 1: on the literally on the ground where all the different
Speaker 1: planes are with regard to the runways and taxi ways.
Speaker 1: Um and um. You know the local controller is in
Speaker 1: the tower as well, watching the sky around met the
Speaker 1: immediate area around the airport. Yeah. And as for what
Speaker 1: kind of technology, these guys are using binoculars also radar
Speaker 1: and so, you know, pretty dated stuff, but it works, right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's one of those things now. Great, if visibility
Speaker 1: is limited, they're going to be relying more in the
Speaker 1: radar than the binoculars. Uh. And if it gets too limited,
Speaker 1: that's when air traffic control says, you know what, the
Speaker 1: conditions are too dangerous for flights to take off and
Speaker 1: land out of this airspace, and so we are going
Speaker 1: to delay any flights, uh for the you know, for
Speaker 1: as long as the weather remains this bad as or
Speaker 1: as of the day that we're actually recording this. This
Speaker 1: guys are full of volcanic ash, right, So if you
Speaker 1: are in the UK and you want to fly someplace
Speaker 1: and you realize that, you know, or the eight air
Speaker 1: Traffic Control realizes that the air is completely filled with
Speaker 1: ash and it's really impacting visibility, you might be grounded. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's funny. Just as an aside that I was listening
Speaker 1: to a report on that this morning and they said, yes,
Speaker 1: you know, there are bits of glass in the air
Speaker 1: thrown up there by the volcano. So yes, as it
Speaker 1: turns out, flying through that is not very healthy, all right, Uh,
Speaker 1: aside from a volcano story, yes, we've got um, we've
Speaker 1: got the local controllers basically keeping an eye on things. UM.
Speaker 1: And they're basically the ones giving clearance to the aircraft
Speaker 1: for it to take off. UM. And as the as
Speaker 1: the plane leaves the ground, the local controller is going
Speaker 1: to hand off the plane, if you will, to the
Speaker 1: departure controller at the tray con facility. UM. It's still
Speaker 1: going to keep an eye on it within five miles
Speaker 1: from the airport, but the pilot is now in communication
Speaker 1: with the departure controller rather than the tower on the
Speaker 1: ground with whom he or she was just speaking. And uh. Actually,
Speaker 1: also as the plane is taking off, here's another piece
Speaker 1: of technology for you, the transponder aboard the aircraft. The
Speaker 1: pilots are are you know, engaging that and um, it
Speaker 1: is identifying radar signals coming in and broadcasting radio a
Speaker 1: signal of its own in the direction of the radar
Speaker 1: waves that are coming to it. So it's locked on
Speaker 1: to the radar and is saying, hey, here, I am here,
Speaker 1: this is who I am, right, I am so transponder.
Speaker 1: When you when you beam the radar signal at the plane,
Speaker 1: the plane says, hey, there's a I've detected the radar signal.
Speaker 1: It's from this direction. I am going to identify who
Speaker 1: I am where I am and uh. It actually has
Speaker 1: an amplifier as well, so it can amplify that signal
Speaker 1: send it back to the radar facility. And then that's
Speaker 1: how the ground can keep track of where planes are
Speaker 1: as they're in the air. And as it turns out,
Speaker 1: aircraft are equipped with radar detectors, although they very infrequently
Speaker 1: get pulled over. Okay, then so the departure controller just
Speaker 1: getting stared at the departure controller is is working at
Speaker 1: the track on facility. Um and uh. You know, the
Speaker 1: track on facility may actually be in charge of several airports.
Speaker 1: We're not just talking a single airport because you know,
Speaker 1: like we said, fifty mile radius, that's a big radius.
Speaker 1: And if you know, if you're in a there, I
Speaker 1: can think of like two airports in the Atlanta area
Speaker 1: right off the top of my head that would fall
Speaker 1: into that depending on where the traycon U was stationed.
Speaker 1: That's right, um and uh. And here again we're talking
Speaker 1: in three dimensions, So not only as the departure controller
Speaker 1: looking for you geographically, he also wants to know what
Speaker 1: the distance is uh vertically, to identify how the distance
Speaker 1: between any ascending and descending aircraft um, because that is
Speaker 1: again important to know. And they have specific ascent corridors
Speaker 1: in various geographic regions. If you've ever taken off from
Speaker 1: there's certain airports where you have a very steep ascent corridor,
Speaker 1: that's true. I've where it's usually because of noise ordinances.
Speaker 1: And then there's the geographical well there's also yes, there's
Speaker 1: some that are geographic as well. But the mountain here
Speaker 1: you need to pull up right, yeah exactly, But there
Speaker 1: there are several where the the local area has a
Speaker 1: noise ordinance where the in order to to obey that ordinance,
Speaker 1: aircraft have to take off at a much steeper incline
Speaker 1: than normal. And if you've ever experienced this, it's kind
Speaker 1: of fun. None if I mean, I enjoy flying, so
Speaker 1: for me, it's for those who are afraid of flying
Speaker 1: the enjoy so much so. Um. Then the plane leaves
Speaker 1: a trayon air space and enters a sector of the
Speaker 1: A R T C C airspace where at least two
Speaker 1: air traffic controllers are keeping an eye on the plane.
Speaker 1: The radar associate controller is looking UM basically correlating the
Speaker 1: flight plane information UM to what's going on, and the
Speaker 1: associate controller is working with the radar controller in charge
Speaker 1: of that sector UM basically that that person is in
Speaker 1: charge of all the air to ground communication and trying
Speaker 1: to make sure that planes are located in a reasonable
Speaker 1: enough distance apart that they are operating safely. Right. And
Speaker 1: you know, these controllers could be monitoring dozens and dozens
Speaker 1: of planes at any given time because it's they're the
Speaker 1: ones in charge of monitoring it over their particular center.
Speaker 1: And as we said, you know there's just twenty one
Speaker 1: of these across the United States. That means that these
Speaker 1: are really big areas. So these guys are are men
Speaker 1: and women. I shouldn't just say guys. Uh, they're keeping
Speaker 1: eyes on on lots of different data all going on
Speaker 1: at the same time. And again we've got like some
Speaker 1: computers that are uh collating all this so that you
Speaker 1: can look at a computer screen and see a data
Speaker 1: representation of what's going on. But a lot of this
Speaker 1: is still going with with humans monitoring tools directly like
Speaker 1: the radar and UM basically the radar handoff controller is
Speaker 1: helping out too with the radar and associate radar controllers
Speaker 1: in situations where there's lots of traffic just to make
Speaker 1: sure that that everything is is going okay, they got
Speaker 1: another set of eyes on the situation. And as you
Speaker 1: go from zone to zone, they hand you off, you know,
Speaker 1: as you leave one space basically the next as as
Speaker 1: part of the air traffic control system as a whole,
Speaker 1: you pass over into the next space and then another
Speaker 1: set of controllers helps you out right. And the data
Speaker 1: from your flight is actually passed on ahead of your flight,
Speaker 1: so it's not like you suddenly appear in someone's center
Speaker 1: and then your data shows up and then they say,
Speaker 1: oh crap, how do we fit them into what's going on?
Speaker 1: Like occasionally aircraft have trouble or there's a or someone
Speaker 1: makes a mistake and UM and the air traffic controllers
Speaker 1: have to react to that and tell pilots to to
Speaker 1: change their flight plan and uh, you know, especially like
Speaker 1: if they if the weather at the destination starts to
Speaker 1: get really bad and it was not expected and they
Speaker 1: have to divert the flight. Uh, you know, you want
Speaker 1: to catch the stuff as early as you possibly can,
Speaker 1: and so um uh in order as part of that,
Speaker 1: as the air air craft is getting closer to the
Speaker 1: border of one center, uh, they'll go ahead and pass
Speaker 1: that data on to the next center ahead of time,
Speaker 1: sometimes up to a half hour ahead of time. And
Speaker 1: then the that way everyone knows where everybody is before
Speaker 1: it becomes a problem. Uh. But yeah, then that the
Speaker 1: pilot will then be communicating with a new radio controller
Speaker 1: and uh a radar control or rather not radio And
Speaker 1: this continues until you get close to your destination. And
Speaker 1: then it basically happens in reverse. Right you you start
Speaker 1: communicating with the tower who can relay the conditions on
Speaker 1: the ground, let you know what's going on as far
Speaker 1: as traffic is concerned. Yeah, essentially it would be you go.
Speaker 1: You would start talking to tracon first, Yes, you would.
Speaker 1: Tracon would would start to to guide the planes in
Speaker 1: so that they are coming in at the proper angle
Speaker 1: for the landing strip. Um. And actually, if you've ever
Speaker 1: seen there's certain movies that show this. I'm thinking of
Speaker 1: Pushing ten in particular. But the air traffic controllers at
Speaker 1: tray Con and the ones at your destination work together
Speaker 1: to uh to get these planes to line up so
Speaker 1: that they can land in an efficient and yet safe manner.
Speaker 1: So you actually can see if you're looking at the
Speaker 1: radar that all these flights that are coming from various directions,
Speaker 1: I mean, like anywhere that you can imagine, you know,
Speaker 1: they're they're coming in, are all lining up like in
Speaker 1: a straight line. Um, this requires a lot of coordination. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it really does. And it's um A pardon my earlier
Speaker 1: oversimplification of the landing process. I just didn't want to
Speaker 1: get that email. No, yeah, I understand, and you and
Speaker 1: you're right, Um, but yeah, I mean it's it's funny
Speaker 1: because the probably the biggest piece of technology in the
Speaker 1: air traffic controller world is the air traffic controllers. The
Speaker 1: human technology involved with it. Yeah, I mean we have
Speaker 1: the radar and and other computer information. But uh, that
Speaker 1: seems like what we were talking earlier about automating the process.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure that you know, the human can we
Speaker 1: can completely automate that process. It seems like people are
Speaker 1: a little too necessary. But uh, in general it seems
Speaker 1: to work. Yeah, if we were to really break it down,
Speaker 1: the actual computer system has lots and lots and lots
Speaker 1: of different little components, each of which handles a very
Speaker 1: specific set of tasks. But it gets so granular at
Speaker 1: that point that it it's almost it's really difficult to
Speaker 1: talk about because uh, you know, you're you you have
Speaker 1: to break it down into such tiny, little little uh segments.
Speaker 1: It's hard to get the big picture at that point.
Speaker 1: It's so to call it a computer system in a
Speaker 1: way is an oversimplification because there's so much stuff going on.
Speaker 1: I mean, you're talking about different alert systems and different
Speaker 1: uh you know, uh, organizational systems. But but we would
Speaker 1: go insane if we tried to break it down into
Speaker 1: every little tiny piece. So uh but yeah, and will
Speaker 1: we ever see it automated? I think we probably will eventually.
Speaker 1: But again, this is one of those things where it's
Speaker 1: it's not just a technology thing, it's a political thing.
Speaker 1: And uh and you know it's not it's not super
Speaker 1: high up on our priorities list right now. Well, considering
Speaker 1: the system is in general working, Yeah, Now, granted, if
Speaker 1: we wanted to add a lot of capacity to that system,
Speaker 1: then we would have to really start looking into upgrading
Speaker 1: it because uh, you know, air traffic control, uh jobs
Speaker 1: are are fairly stressful, Yes, one of those. I mean,
Speaker 1: you think about it. You're in charge of the safety
Speaker 1: of thousands of people every single day you go to work. So, um,
Speaker 1: you don't want to make a mistake. Yeah, you don't
Speaker 1: want to make their jobs more difficult. But um, but yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's I'm glad we uh we've had a conversation
Speaker 1: about that was fun. Yeah all right, Well, if any
Speaker 1: of you guys have some fun conversation topics he wants
Speaker 1: to tackle, you should email us. Our email address is
Speaker 1: tech Stuff at how stuff works dot com. You can
Speaker 1: emails kind of like this next example of listener mail.
Speaker 1: This listener mail comes from Johnny, and Johnny says, here's
Speaker 1: a funny pun. I found people who plug their computer
Speaker 1: keyboards into Hi Fi systems aren't idiots. That would be stereotyping. Also,
Speaker 1: on your microwave podcast, do all the waves get reflected
Speaker 1: or do some escape? My mom says I should stand
Speaker 1: five feet away from the microwave when it's on. Is
Speaker 1: this necessary? Um? First of all, well, Johnny always obey
Speaker 1: your mother. Yeah, Johnny's mom, I I have I have
Speaker 1: expressly told him to obey you. Um, but I think
Speaker 1: it probably stems from an earlier incident you're not telling
Speaker 1: us about. Well, my name is also Onathan, and I'm
Speaker 1: i am Southern, so I'm a mama's boy. But no,
Speaker 1: the to get to your question about microwaves and whether
Speaker 1: or not any escape, Uh, well, first of all, microwaves
Speaker 1: aren't really There are microwaves that are out and about already, yes,
Speaker 1: not just not just coming from the microwave oven. But
Speaker 1: the mesh that's on the door of the microwave is
Speaker 1: because the microwaves are so big they can't pass through
Speaker 1: that mesh. The mesh is gonna reflect them right back. Um.
Speaker 1: So really, the whole fear of radiation leaking out is
Speaker 1: a little overblown. Now, granted, if your microwave was somehow damaged,
Speaker 1: then yes, microwaves might be able to escape the the door,
Speaker 1: but in which the microwave anymore. No, But even then,
Speaker 1: as as the founder the the guy who invented the
Speaker 1: microwave oven could tell you, um, it's not necessarily gonna
Speaker 1: cause you irreparable harm immediately. It might mal your chocolate bar.
Speaker 1: That's true. As we discussed in an earlier podcast, the
Speaker 1: person who discovered the microwave was figured it out because
Speaker 1: he was standing next to a device that was admitting
Speaker 1: microwaves and his candy bar moult. It was a radar
Speaker 1: te radar antenna and that was where you know he
Speaker 1: was doing start radar. I feel like I've heard that exactly. Um,
Speaker 1: you must have been watching mash So thanks a lot, Johnny.
Speaker 1: I hope you guys enjoyed this show. Also, we have
Speaker 1: some cool announcements to make. Indeed, one is that if
Speaker 1: you are on Facebook and you like tex stuff, now
Speaker 1: you can like tex stuff while you are on Facebook
Speaker 1: because we have a tech stuff fan page. So do
Speaker 1: a little search in Facebook and you'll you'll find the
Speaker 1: tech stuff fan page and joined that because we're gonna
Speaker 1: have links to different articles and blog posts and discussions
Speaker 1: and things of that nature on there. And if you
Speaker 1: are on the Twitter, you can follow the official text
Speaker 1: stuff Twitter account, which is tech Stuff h s W.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I've go to uh to twitter dot com
Speaker 1: slash tech stuff h s W. That is the official
Speaker 1: tech stuff Twitter feed. Yep, you'll see our I don't
Speaker 1: know album cover on there, so you'll know you're in
Speaker 1: the right place. As a matter of fact, you you
Speaker 1: can also follow all of the how Stuff Works podcasts
Speaker 1: and blogs because now we all have our own new
Speaker 1: fan pages and stuff. It's not that you'd want to know,
Speaker 1: because we're you know, far and above right, because we
Speaker 1: know how Twitter works and they don't. We plan on
Speaker 1: using that to our advantage. All right, We'll hope you
Speaker 1: enjoyed the show, and Chris and I will taught to
Speaker 1: you again really soon. If you're a tech stuff fan,
Speaker 1: be sure to check us out on Twitter tech Stuff
Speaker 1: hs WSR handle, and you can also find us on
Speaker 1: Facebook at Facebook dot com slash tech Stuff h s
Speaker 1: W for more on this and thousands of about their topics.
Speaker 1: Does it how stuff works dot com, And be sure
Speaker 1: to check out the new tech stuff blog now on
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