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| Re: Boeing jet to break distance record (74187) | |||
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Re: Boeing jet to break distance record |
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Posted by aem7ac on Thu Nov 10 11:24:44 2005, in response to Re: Boeing jet to break distance record, posted by RonInBayside on Thu Nov 10 11:12:34 2005. Perhaps my question was a bit different: You and I each have an airplane (the same model). I can fly once per day a long-distance route; you fly 4 times per day a shorter route. Which of us, at the end of the day, burned more fuel per passenger-mile?London-Boston: 3,000 miles. New York-Boston: Fly 10 times, 300 miles (for the sake of argument). To fly 3,000 miles, I might need 150,000 lbs of fuel. I have to load all this fuel up front in London. That leaves me some 250,000 lbs for payload (on a 767). To fly 300 miles, I would need about 20,000 lbs of fuel. I can load fuel each time I sit on the tarmac. So each take off on the airframe would allow 380,000 lbs of payload. Of course, you can't really fit 380,000 lbs worth of crap in a 767, unless you were flying lead or something. And there are other constraints, like runway length, and whether the freight is there, and the fixed infrastructure like seats for passengers and/or cargo compartments if a cargo plane. So, it's a very complicated function... because there are many constraints. But as a rule of thumb, you are better off flying well below the maximum design range of the plane in terms of fuel -- to get the maximum payload. Think about it for a minute. Why do freighters stop for refuel in Anchorage when flying from Midwest to the Far East, and why do passenger jets not do the same? The same planes (with a different fuselage configuration) are used on those routes. The reason short routes make more money has nothing to do with fuel and everything to do with maintenance, utilization, and most of all, travel demand. AEM7AC |
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