Flying for business or pleasure is one of the most thrilling experiences in the world, but it remains full of mystery for the average traveller.
Curious passengers have burning questions every time they set foot on a plane - from whether pilots require a key to start a plane to where flight attendants sleep on long-haul flights.
Here experts debunk some of the myths and answer some of travellers’ questions.
How do pilots start a plane?
It’s not as simple as turning a key or pushing a single button. It’s “a little more complicated” than starting a car, said Captain Piers Applegarth, a representative of the British Airline Pilots Association.
The retired training captain said an air start motor rotated the jet engines before adding fuel and starting the ignition.
“This means that there are a few levers and buttons that need to be moved.
On modern aircraft, most of this is done automatically once the start sequence is initiated but a pilot can still start it manually.’
Is the crew served the same food as passengers?
If meals are provided by the airline, pilots do not eat the same reheated chicken or pasta dishes served to passengers in economy.
To reduce the risk of food poisoning, the captain and co-pilot usually eat different meals, said Applegarth.
Like passengers, the flight crew can bring their own food on board, but the meals provided to them are the same or variations of the meals provided to passengers in business class.
Caterers will sometimes load meals designated specifically for the crew, said Patrick Smith, a pilot and author of Cockpit Confidential.
He said: “At my airline we are given a menu prior to departure and will write down our entree preferences - first choice, plus at least one alternative.
“Eating in the cockpit can be messy, so on international flights I usually take my meals in the cabin, on my rest break.
“With potential illness in mind, pilots are encouraged to eat different entrees, but this is not a hard and fast rule. In practice it comes to down to your preferences and what’s available.’
Where do pilots and cabin crew sleep and go to the loo?
Planes that flew long-haul routes which required more than two pilots usually contained private bunks for the flight crew, said Applegarth.
In other cases pilots tried to catch some shut-eye in special rest seats allocated for them within or near the cockpit, or within the passenger cabin, he added.
“Generally flights less than about 10 hours and 30 minutes only carry two pilots. For longer flights extra pilots are carried so that each pilot can have a chance to sleep and be rested for the landing.’
The Airbus A380, which is the world’s largest passenger airliner, has private sleeping quarters below its decks which flight attendants use for rest.
Smith said: ‘Flight attendants also work in shifts, and similarly to the pilots, their rest quarters can either be a designated block of cabin seats or a separate room somewhere.
“Many flight attendants’ rest quarters are located in the far aft of the plane, above or below the main deck, and can accommodate six or more cabin crew simultaneously.’
When nature calls, flight and cabin crew on most planes use the same toilets as passengers.
“The Boeing 747, the original jumbo jet, has a lavatory just for pilots.
What happens if a toilet’s tank fills up?
The toilets cannot be emptied in the sky, so that means all of the human waste is stored on board until the plane lands and a ground crew empties the tanks.
“If the toilet becomes full then it is out of action and the flight attendants block out the toilet so it can’t be used,’ said Applegarth.
Prior to any long-haul flight the crew would verify that the toilets had been serviced and the waste tanks were empty, Smith added.
He said: “It seldom happens, but if a particular lavatory tank fills or overflows en route, that lav will be closed off. It’s extremely unusual for all of the lavs to become unusable - a serious situation that could result in the flight being diverted.’
Why do planes leave long white trails in the sky?
These condensation trails form when humid exhaust from jet engines cools very quickly in colder and dryer air at higher altitudes.
Smith said: “It’s not unlike the fog that results when you exhale on a cold day. In other words, contrails are clouds.
“Water vapour, strange as it might seem, is a by-product of the combustion within jet engines, which is where the humidity comes from.’
What would happen if a plane’s door suddenly opened mid-flight?
This ranks among passengers’ biggest fears, but Applegarth said it was extremely unlikely, if not impossible, for someone to open the door as the pressure inside the plane was much greater than the pressure outside.
He said: “This means the door is being forced closed. Not even the world’s strongest man would be able to open it.”
Smith added: “In addition to any mechanical latching, most aircraft doors open inwards before they open outwards, and like a drain plug they are held in place by the forces of the pressurised cabin.
“If a door were to open somehow, the result would be a very quick decompression, though in all likelihood not a destructive or catastrophic one.”
How much money does an airline pocket from each ticket sale?
A recent Travelzoo study found that British Airways’s profit margin for each £690 ticket it sold for a flight from London to New York was just £4.24 (R75), accounting for 0.61 percent of the overall cost.
Almost the entire cost of the return flight went towards taxes, surcharges and operating costs.
Smith said budget airlines probably made nothing from their super-cheap promotional fares, and margins on an average economy class ticket were similarly thin.
Daily Mail