Letters to the Editor
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You're Delusional
Seriously, all that over the A380's little forehead? The A380 may have evidence of a braincase, but the B747 is a hideously deformed mutant which should never have survived the intense radiation that must have corrupted it in the womb.
No offense, but I can't see anything in your statements that looks like reality rather than some sort of weird, twisted nostalgia tinged by anger at the very existence of a new kid on the block.
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Lift Without Weight Equals...
Patrick,
One of the things that I truly love about your column is the way you dissect the intricate minutiae of flight and translate it into a textual tapestry that the average layman can understand. Notwithstanding this talent you occasionally err- and in this case you have erred in a pretty significant way. I agree that making things intelligible to the common man frequently involves reducing them to their core essences. But I do not agree that making patently false or otherwise inaccurate statements is acceptable. To whit you wrote:
“Getting off the ground is a function of lift, thrust and acceleration, not weight per se.”
Ummmm. You know as well as I do that the four forces relevant to flight are lift, thrust, weight, and drag. Ignore any one of these at your peril!! Lift is the opposite of weight, and thrust is the opposite of drag. To state that getting off the ground is related to lift, but not to weight is a bit Rovian in its twisting of reality. Please forgive me for offering what I think you were trying to say:
“Getting off the ground is not simply a function of how heavy an airplane is. Rather it is a function of how much lift the wing needs to generate to overcome the weight of the airplane, and how quickly it can get to the airspeed which will allow it to generate that lift. As silly as it sounds: If you had enough thrust a 747 could take off in the distance of a football field!! The A380 has no issue with runway lengths primarily because it has enough thrust to accelerate it to a speed where its wing generates enough lift to allow it to use currently existing runways.
Make it understandable- you do this very well. But don’t change the basic laws of flight- those are immutable and as you probably know- highly unforgiving!! (As apparently am I!!)
Cheers,
dce
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Most hideous article ever conceived.
Patrick,
Your articles are getting worse each week. You used to be insightful and informative. Now, you are just regurgitating the same crap we can read everywhere else. I'm sure you are a good pilot, but probably not such a good aeronautical engineer, and probably an even worse designer. Stick with what you know, which is why we read. Continue degenerating to the Boeing is better than Airbus crap and we'll stop all together.
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It's not _that_ ugly--and there's more interesting stuff out there
Yes, it's kind of an ugly plane, but like you say, you've mentioned it many times in the past. Enough. (Though I disagree with previous posters to this extent: the 747 really is a better-looking airplane.)
However, as an indirect result of this article, I ran across an interesting after-action-report on a 1997 Fed-Ex crash at EWR. (I lived 20 miles away at the time, and somehow never heard about it.)
A few more articles on NTSB AARs would be a lot more interesting. The one I found was this:
in which it discusses 'destabilized flare', 'pilot-induced oscillation,' landing-gear & wing failure modes, and other cool stuff. It also discusses what the FAA, Boeing, and Fed-Ex did in response to the crash. It makes fascinating reading even for a non-specialist.
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I forgot to include the link:
Here's the article on N611FE, Fed-ex MD11 crashed in EWR.
http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19970731-0
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The A340 is sexier than the A380
I concur that there is a sort of regal elegance to the cockpit and nose of a 747, which is in stark contrast to the cockpit and nose of the A380. The latter looks like a beluga whale that lost a boxing match in 13 rounds. Oddly, I find Airbus's A340 to be one of the most attractive airplanes ever. One would think that the folks at Airbus could have been a bit more creative with the A380.
In any case, I'm just waiting for them to make another "Airport" movie involving a stricken A380...
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747-8
You're right about the 747-8 - it sure looks beautiful.
What is going to be special about the 747-8? I love the fact that it is clearly a 747, yet there appears to be new tapering aft/below and in the shape of the cross section. Cool!
I can't wait to hear about your first flight experience on the A380. I understand that one of the debut commercial routes is Singapore-Sydney. That can't be a terribly long flight, can it? 6 hours, maybe? Am I far off?
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what about a pic?
Could you provide a link to what the 380 looks like for those who haven't been keeping score?
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here we go again
I already complained a while ago about Patrick's obsession with denigrating the looks of the A380. Frankly, I don't see what the big deal is. Granted, it's certainly not beautiful as the 747 is, but apart from the size, the A380 looks like a fairly average jetliner to me.
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747 is to me...
I don't travel much by air unless I'm crossing an ocean and will be gone for trips of 3 months to 3 years (yes, years) and when I get to the gate and see a 747 out there waiting, I get a great feeling. I don't get that with a 767 or A340. There is something about that plane that I like. To me, it will always symbolize long distance travel.
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Are you other letter writers blind??
The A380 is hideous.
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Boeing almost made the ugliest airliner
i came across this in wikipedia, something called the "Hunchback of Mukilteo", that combined a 767 with the aft portion of the 757. this would have really looked out of place. i'm glad someone came to their senses and canned it.
http://books.google.com/books?id=86Tq6pQ0xf8C&pg=PA11&lpg=PA11&dq=hunchback+mukilteo+757&source=web&ots=P4j1OS3O9_&sig=iwxued6iMJ-CEtU4KeITSIQVXGk
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It's big, but there are still only two aisles...
I'm not as much of a A380 external profile hater as Patrick -- for me it's a case of A3-bland-0.
What makes me hesitate is the seat configuration. Getting past one sleeping person you don't know is barely tolerable -- but getting past two!?
All of the main-deck configs I've seen in economy for the A380 have 3-4-3. Which means in every single row, two poor suckers have to get almost intimate with two total strangers to, say, take a bathroom trip.
It's the worst part of long-haul -- and the A380 does nothing whatsoever to alleviate it. I understand I'm flying cattle-class, so squeezing past one person is probably required, but must inconveniencing a majority of your row-sharers for your own convenience be compulsory?
Is there anything besides tradition stopping a 2-3-3-2 layout (three slightly narrower aisles) on this huge plane? Food service would be faster, getting on and off less painful, and you wouldn't have to give two just-rudely-awoken strangers a lapdance to use the head...