The Flying Book

by David Blatner

  Don’t blame Boeing or Airbus for long bathroom lines. Decisions about the number of lavatories on a plane, how large they should be, and what amenities they have are all made by the airline companies. Typically, there’s an average of about one toilet for every forty-six passengers in economy class, and one for every eleven seats in first class, but the average Boeing 737 has only one toilet for every sixty-three coach passengers.

  Neither Boeing nor Airbus actually constructs the lavatories themselves; like almost everything else inside the cabin, these are modular units designed and manufactured by outside suppliers. Airbus purchases “lavs” from German-based Dasell Cabin Interior, while Boeing uses the Japanese firms Jamco and Yokohama Rubber for their wide-body and narrow-body jets, respectively.

  Of course, today’s toilets have come a long way since the 1920s and 1930s, when raising the toilet seat would reveal nothing more than a hole to the passing landscape below. Flush toilets made their debut in the ultraelegant Boeing 314 “Clippers” and were slowly refined until 1982, when Boeing introduced the first in-flight vacuum toilet system.

  Vacuum toilets are far superior to the old flush types for several reasons. First, they require very little water—only about eight ounces of water per flush, rather than over a gallon of blue disinfectant in the older toilets. (Water weighs about 8.3 pounds per gallon, so carrying less water means a lighter, more efficient airplane.)

  Couples engaging in in-flight sex is rare, but less rare than you might think. Cramped lavatories may be lacking in atmosphere, but they seem to be a popular spot for gaining entrance to the “Mile High Club.” In fact, Virgin Atlantic Airways recently announced plans to retrofit newly introduced baby changing stations in the “lavs” on their aircraft because they keep getting broken. (Virgin has surmised that the damage is more likely due to amorous couples than to oversized babies.)

  Second, the old toilets emptied into separate holding tanks directly beneath each lavatory, which leaked less-than-pleasant smells. Vacuum systems work by momentarily opening a valve to the outside air, creating a pressure differential that sucks the contents from the toilet bowl (which is lined with a teflon-like substance) through pipes to a holding tank in the back of the airplane at about 100 feet per second. If the aircraft is below 16,000 feet, the pressure difference between the air inside and outside the airplane isn’t great enough, so there’s a built-in “backup” vacuum-generator. The vacuum systems are lighter, easier to fix, and easier to clean than the flush systems (the holding tank is emptied every time the airplane lands).

  Another reason the vacuum toilet systems are generally less smelly is that some lavatory air is sucked out, too. However, on occasion, flight attendants are forced to place coffee packets in the lavatories. (They claim coffee is a natural deodorant.) Or they will pull the sink plunger up for a short time in order to suck out more air. This works partly because the sinks aren’t connected to the toilet holding tanks; instead, sink water is sprayed out the back of the aircraft during flight, where it vaporizes. The small nozzle near the tail must be specially heated so that it doesn’t freeze up at the extremely cold cruising-altitude temperatures.

  Curiously, some passengers dislike the vacuum toilets because they’re afraid of being sucked in. Don’t worry; the hole is simply too small. It is worth noting, however, that you shouldn’t try flushing the toilet while seated. In 2001, a passenger flying across the Atlantic on a Boeing 767 became vacuum sealed to a toilet seat after flushing—mechanics were later able to pry her loose after the aircraft landed.

  Whatever you do, don’t try to smoke in an airplane toilet or disconnect the smoke detector. These are federal offenses for a reason: In 1973, a Boeing 707 jet had to make an emergency landing outside Paris after a fire was started in one of the lavatories, probably from a disposed cigarette. By the time the airplane landed and a rescue crew could open the airplane, almost all the passengers had died. Ten years later, an electrical fire broke out in a lavatory on a flight from Texas to Canada, and half the passengers and crew were killed.

  To begin their boarding process, the airline announces they will preboard certain passengers. And I wonder, How can that be? How can people board before they board? This I gotta see…Then they mention that it’s a nonstop flight. Well, I must say I don’t care for that sort of thing. Call me old-fashioned, but I insist that my flight stop. Preferably at an airport. Somehow those sudden cornfield stops interfere with the flow of my day…As part of the continuing folderol, I’m asked to put my seat-back forward. Well, unfortunately for the others in the cabin, I don’t bend that way. If I could put my seat-back forward I’d be in porno movies.

  Then they say we’ll be “landing shortly.” Doesn’t that sound like we’re going to miss the runway? “Final approach” is not too promising either. “Final” is not a good word to be using on an airplane. Sometimes the pilot will speak up and say, “We’ll be on the ground in fifteen minutes.” Well that’s a little vague…Which brings us to terminal. Another unfortunate word to be using in association with air travel. And they use it all over the airport, don’t they? Somehow I can’t get hungry at a place called The Terminal Restaurant. Then again, if you’ve ever eaten there, you know the name is quite appropriate.”

  —George Carlin, NAPALM & SILLY PUTTY

  Fill ’er Up:

  Airplane Fuel

  Airplanes consume a lot of fuel: A typical narrow-body jet will burn about 75 gallons of fuel just taxiing out to the runway and then burn about 800 gallons of fuel per hour while in flight. However, aviation professionals don’t talk in terms of gallons, they talk about pounds of fuel. Jet fuel, which is basically a form of refined oil like kerosene or parafin, weighs about 6.7 pounds per gallon, so you (or your calculator) can figure that the airlines load around 5,300 pounds of fuel for each hour the aircraft will be in flight, plus about 1,000 pounds for taxiing to and from the runway. They then add enough fuel to redirect the airplane to an alternate airport and stay in a holding pattern for almost an hour. All told, an aircraft like a Boeing 737 may be carrying between 8,000 and 30,000 pounds of fuel when it takes off.

  Larger aircraft carry even more. A Boeing 777 runs through about 2,000 gallons (13,400 pounds) of fuel each hour of flight. The Boeing 747, with four engines carrying an aircraft that weighs as much as 870,000 pounds, burns over a gallon of fuel every second, or almost 4,000 gallons (26,800 pounds) of jet fuel per hour.

  The Boeing 747, which averages about 6 gallons of fuel per mile flown, or .16 miles per gallon, seems like a real gas hog. However, when you figure that the aircraft is carrying perhaps 200 people, it actually gets over three times better gas mileage per passenger than an average single-passenger sport utility vehicle.

  Airports are also giant refueling stations. For instance, Denver International Airport has eighteen 3-million-gallon (11-million-liter) storage tanks fed by a dedicated fuel pipeline that can bring more than 90,000 gallons of jet fuel into the airport each hour. Fuel can then be pumped directly to each gate or loaded into tanker trucks and driven out to an airplane. The ground crew attaches a fuel hose to each of the aircraft’s tanks (usually located on the bottomside of the wings, and sometimes fuselage), making sure that they attach a grounding wire first, to prevent electrical sparks during refueling. When the hose is turned on, the crew can load the airplane’s tanks at about 1,000 gallons (6,700 pounds) per minute. That’s like fueling 100 cars at the same time!

  If you want to fly somewhere…first, you have to stand in line to get a boarding pass. That is to replace the ticket they just sold you. Then you have to stand in line to show your boarding pass. That is to prove you bought the ticket they just took away from you. This lets you stand in line to be checked for bombs. Next, you have to stand in line to give back the boarding pass they just gave you…This done, you get to stand in line to get on the plane, which enables you to stand in line to go down the plane.

  —Henry Mintzberg, WHY I HATE FLYING

  Jet fuel is less expensiv
e than automobile gasoline, but it still adds up. In 2002, the cost of jet fuel averaged about seventy cents a gallon; that means it costs about $40,000 just to fill a Boeing 747’s tanks. Fuel alone makes up about 15 percent of a major airline’s operating costs (second only to labor, which averages around 36 percent of an airline’s costs). This is why airlines are constantly interested in eking out even a tiny bit more fuel efficiency.

  Airport Security

  In today’s security-conscious world, it seems strange that only forty years ago airport security was almost exclusively aimed at stopping smugglers and pickpockets. People would often gather on the tarmac to see family members off on a journey. You could drive to the end of the runway to watch flights take off and land. You could even visit the cockpit during a flight to talk with the pilots. However, an increase in politically motivated hijackings and terrorist bombings in the 1960s quickly changed the security landscape.

  In 1972, the FAA insisted that airlines begin searching passengers and their bags, and airports hastily set up metal detectors (called magnetometers) based on devices originally used in lumber mills to find pieces of metal inside logs. As you walk through a magnetometer, a large metal coil creates a magnetic field that is affected by any metal you’re carrying; a large enough deviance in the field causes an alarm to sound.

  Some privacy groups in the United States actually took the FAA to court, arguing that the use of these machines violated the Fourth Amendment, the protection against illegal searches and seizures. The courts agreed that while this was a violation, it was acceptable as long as it was limited to searching for weapons and explosives, and as long as it was applied universally to all passengers.

  Security Today

  Today, both magnetometers and X-ray machines are standard equipment at all airports serving major airlines. X rays are very-high-energy light waves that can’t be seen but can actually pass through most solid objects. Because different materials absorb different amounts of X rays, a sensor can quickly identify organic, inorganic, and metal objects inside your closed bags. Trained operators aren’t only looking for knives; they also try to recognize organic material that might indicate an explosive substance.

  If a bag is too densely packed, or contains a laptop computer (which itself is extremely densely packed), the security officials may want to hand-check the contents or use a sniffer—a computerized chemistry lab in a box, which can quickly analyze a swab rubbed on you or your bag and sound an alert if there is even a tiny trace of any explosive chemical.

  Note that everything beyond the security checkpoint is x-rayed, including the food and dishes at the airport restaurants, the magazines at the newsstands, and the coffee carts. For a while, some airline employees didn’t have to undergo these kinds of checks, but that quickly changed in 1987 after a recently dismissed employee bypassed security by flashing his ID card and snuck a gun onto a flight. (He later shot the pilots and crashed the airplane.)

  Similarly, until 2001, it was common practice for some airlines to leave their cockpit doors propped open on long international flights to make it easier for pilots and flight attendants to go in and out. However, it took only weeks after the September 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon before airlines began to install reinforced cockpit doors, ensure that they were kept closed during flight, and even further restrict what people could bring on board.

  In the wake of September 11, governments around the world scrambled to find better methods of securing their commercial aircraft. Many pundits pointed to the paragon of airline security, Israel’s El Al airline, which not only uses high-tech devices to scan passengers and their baggage, but interrogates them with a barrage of questions such as “Why do you want to visit Israel?” or “Where did you travel while in the country and who did you visit?” Guards look for any suspicious behavior, from shifty eyes to a wavering voice.

  On the other hand, most U.S. airports need to process thousands more passengers than El Al, leading them to rely more heavily on mechanical solutions. For example, airline computer systems flag suspicious passengers, such as those who bought a one-way ticket or who aren’t frequent flyers on record with the airline. This has led to some absurd situations, such as infants being carefully searched at the gate while their parents stand by, bewildered. Some airlines, in an attempt to save time and money, are apparently trying to do away with human interaction altogether, offering the chance to print boarding passes at kiosks or even from a secure Web site before leaving for the airport (which are then verified with a quick glance at a photo I.D. before boarding).

  Security Tomorrow

  Airport security—like scheduling or any of the other extraordinarily complex systems that make up the commerical aviation industry—will never be perfect. After all, nothing ever is. But every year each of these systems becomes a bit safer, a bit more robust, and a bit more precise.

  Luggage

  Getting on a plane, I told the ticket lady, “Send one of my bags to New York, send one to Los Angeles, and send one to Miami.”

  She said, “We can’t do that!” I told her, “You did it last week!”

  —Comedian Henny Youngman

  While passengers grimace at the idea of airplane food, and tremble at the idea of turbulence, when it comes to the treatment of airline luggage, people tend to follow the old adage “If I didn’t laugh, I’d cry.” Of course disappearing luggage is no joke when it happens to you, and recently the number of complaints filed about baggage being lost or damaged has even surpassed that of complaints about delays. So what actually happens to your bags when you hand them off at the ticket counter or curbside check-in?

  Moving Bags

  Once you entrust your precious cargo to an airline representative, he or she attaches to it a tag that contains a ten-digit code plus a bunch of information about you and your travel routing: airlines, flight numbers, transfer cities, destination, and so on. This usually appears in both human-readable text and computer-readable bar codes. If your bag or box is particularly heavy, the airline may charge you an overweight baggage fee (because the heavier the airplane, the more fuel it burns). Then the bag is placed on a conveyor belt, and it disappears from your sight.

  The airlines are facing strike threats from a number of key unions, including the Brotherhood of Luggage Misplacers, the Airline Seat Shrinkers Guild, and the International Association of Workers Who Make Sure That No Coach Passenger’s In-flight Snack Packet Contains More Than Four Pretzels.

  —Columnist Dave Barry

  The scientific theory I like best is that the rings of Saturn are composed entirely of lost airline luggage.

  —Satirist Mark Russell

  Your luggage now enters a race to get to the right airplane at the right time. In most airports around the world, airline employees read each tag individually, heft bags from the primary conveyor belt onto the appropriate cart, drive the cart to the appropriate airplane, and then load the bags onto a conveyor belt leading into the aircraft’s cargo hold where other employees place the bags securely. In large wide-body aircraft, baggage handlers first load the cargo into one of several enclosed, metal cargo palettes that are then rolled into the belly of the airplane and locked down for the flight.

  However, some airports are so large and handle so much baggage that it’s impractical to rely on humans to haul everything from place to place. For example, the San Francisco International Airport alone handles more than 60,000 bags each day. Large airports like this one have computerized luggage-moving systems that rely on a complex series of conveyor belts and chutes.

  In this kind of system, your bag’s tag is first scanned by a set of laser-beam bar code readers surrounding the primary conveyor belt, similar to the ones at supermarkets. About 10 percent of the time, the tag is folded or otherwise unreadable, and a high-speed mechanical pusher arm immediately shoves the bag to another conveyor to get scanned by hand. Either way, from this moment, the bag is constantly tracked from place to place by hun
dreds of networked computers, which are also aware of your itinerary and the schedules of every airplane at the airport.

  It’s not surprising that bags get scratched and scuffed. As they trundle along, they encounter a series of large metal pushers, each of which can shove as many as eighty bags per minute from one conveyor belt to another at just the right moment. Finally, a robotic arm pushes your bag down a chute, where someone loads it onto a truck destined for your flight. If the system’s timing is off, your bag ends up on the wrong truck, and then the wrong airplane.

  Everyone knows you shouldn’t bring explosives or hazardous chemicals on board an aircraft. But did you know mercury is prohibited? Mercury causes aluminum (which many airplanes are made of) to corrode, almost like dry rot in wood. If you drop mercury on the floor of an airplane, it will spread around and a large portion of the fuselage may have to be scrapped. Mercury in a barometer or a personal thermometer is usually allowed if it is entirely enclosed in a protective case.

  Some huge airports, like Denver International, have done away with the handloading of trucks altogether, and each bag drops from a chute into a moving destination-coded vehicle (DCV)—a small rail cart that travels along miles of twisting underground tracks at almost 20 mph (32 km/hr). The DCV never stops rolling along its mazelike tracks; it simply tips its open-topped bin over at precisely the right moment to receive a bag (one bag per DCV), tips it back up while in transit, and then tips again at the correct moment to drop the bag out at its destination.