Mopping Up the Mess

If you read my last passion blog, you received just about the most transparent view into my mind without cutting it open. You can already tell I love airplanes, but I must admit that my thoughts can run adrift. Therefore, before diving deeper into the black hole of aviation, I want to talk about environmental effects and misconceptions.

At the end of the last post, I left you all to appreciate a picture of the legendary Aubrey Drake Graham (I don’t think he is a legend, but it would be impossible to deny his worshippers that status). The last segment demonstrated a toxic part of luxury in the modern world. Airplanes are still powered using non-renewable fuels. Sadly, this may not change in the near future due to the amount of power it takes to propel an airframe. However, this directly coincides with the main benefactor of airplanes and their capabilities.

When aircraft are used to their full potential, they are incredibly efficient machines. One flight with 200 people would use approximately 100 miles per gallon for every person on the flight for the standard Boeing 737. Now when do these numbers get skewed? They get ruined by the rich, privileged CEO of a company that decides to take joy rides all over the world, providing no meaningful transportation or purpose.

Airplanes have been engineered, built, modified, and perfected many times to be the most efficient, quick, safe, and comfortable type of transport ever seen. It just irks me when I see influencers hopping inside a jet for the cool factor, and I hope it does the same to you too.

Oh, you know what is always fun! Conspiracy theories! I’m glad we agree on that; now, let’s talk about the conspiracy behind contrails. Some people in the world believe that the government and/or the “deep state” is intentionally releasing chemicals from airplanes into the environment. These trails of what theorists deem chemicals are referred to as “chemtrails.” These chemtrails are supposedly being used to control peoples’ minds/political beliefs and lower life expectancy. I mean, I’m not going to draw any irrational conclusions here, but that sounds an awful lot like the vaccination conspiracies.

If there is one thing I want you to leave with today, it is knowledge about what contrails actually are. Airplanes move incredibly fast in the atmosphere, with their engine(s) running at extremely high temperatures. After the hot air in the engines is expelled into the atmosphere, it flash-freezes and creates a trail of ice behind the aircraft. These contrails are nontoxic to the environment and eventually condense into water, which is why we see the contrails disappear behind the plane.

However, just like anything in life, there is still a negative aspect. In places where air travel is frequent, these contrails can envelop a large portion of the sky and trap heat in the atmosphere. This is not much of a problem during the daytime because they reflect an equal amount of heat away from the Earth as they absorb. During the night, the contrails only absorb heat and do not reflect heat from the sun (TLDR: no sun = more heat trapped). We can help with this problem, thankfully, and it’s actually a pretty simple fix. This effect could be greatly reduced if people booked more morning and afternoon flights. Tell your family, tell your friends, and tell that one guy you always pass on the way to your classes to not book night flights. Oh, and tell them to read the world’s most cursed blog. See you all next week, peace.