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[STEMO]

Airliners at cruising height (FL300-FL410) normally report outside temps in the -50C to -60C range. -56C seems to be the most common one. I doubt a Shackleton bothered those altitudes very often though :-)

Haven't personally seen anything colder than -60C, but not saying it doesn't happen.

The Tristar etc at BA easily, and regularly flew over 30,000 

Once again, I'm no expert, but surely temperature at altitude will depend on which part of the world you're in.

This is also true. Lots of variables and the aircraft have to reliably perform in any conditions that they might encounter.

Fuselages are heavily insulated to help stabilise internal temperatures.

Avionics hot air gets expelled into the forward hold and/or out of a vent. This depends on altitude and cabin pressure.

Bleed air from the engines/apu/external source is used to pressurise the cabin via the AC packs which regulate the chosen temperature. The pressure is regulated by a flap at the rear of the aircraft.

This system can keep an A340 cabin at 25°C on the gound in Antarctica with a door open and at the other extreme at about 15° on the ground in Dubai.

Without any bleed air, and doors closed, the cabin temps can easily hit 35-40° on the apron at Gatwick at this time of year. Doors open with a slight breeze running through the cabin takes the edge off.

With all the electronics powered up, even with the flight deck windows open, it's not uncommon for the flight deck temps to be north of 30° in the hangar. Again, no bleed air.

Which is Flight level 300, surely?

[Doctor Gollum]

It is

I made that observation because the official ceiling of the Shackleton is 20,000 ft, and Chris had a post RAF job at BA

[LC0112G]

Airliners at cruising height (FL300-FL410) normally report outside temps in the -50C to -60C range. -56C seems to be the most common one. I doubt a Shackleton bothered those altitudes very often though :-)

Haven't personally seen anything colder than -60C, but not saying it doesn't happen.

The Tristar etc at BA easily, and regularly flew over 30,000 

I said Shackleton, not Shackeng. A previous Avitar Shackeng used suggests he preferred 8 screws to 3 blow jobs :-)

IIRC some older aircraft were certified up to eithr FL450 or FL490 - I think Learjets and possibly early B-747's . The newer stuff struggles not through technical capability, but because regulations now give a time limit to get from maximum cruising altitude down to 18000? ft in the event of a sudden cabin depressurisation. Therefore most newer stuff, including all the Airbus liners, are only certified to FL410. AIUI.

[Doctor Gollum]

Airliners at cruising height (FL300-FL410) normally report outside temps in the -50C to -60C range. -56C seems to be the most common one. I doubt a Shackleton bothered those altitudes very often though :-)

Haven't personally seen anything colder than -60C, but not saying it doesn't happen.

The Tristar etc at BA easily, and regularly flew over 30,000 

I said Shackleton, not Shackeng. A previous Avitar Shackeng used suggests he preferred 8 screws to 3 blow jobs :-)

IIRC some older aircraft were certified up to eithr FL450 or FL490 - I think Learjets and possibly early B-747's . The newer stuff struggles not through technical capability, but because regulations now give a time limit to get from maximum cruising altitude down to 18000? ft in the event of a sudden cabin depressurisation. Therefore most newer stuff, including all the Airbus liners, are only certified to FL410. AIUI.

China Airlines obviously didn't get that memo...

Their A350 flight from Taipei to Auckland is currently sat at FL420

Incidentally, it looks like Sippy Cup Joe is slumming it at FL340 in his C32... A bit of a comedown from all the faff of his arrival at Mildenhall...

[Shackeng]

Airliners at cruising height (FL300-FL410) normally report outside temps in the -50C to -60C range. -56C seems to be the most common one. I doubt a Shackleton bothered those altitudes very often though :-)

Haven't personally seen anything colder than -60C, but not saying it doesn't happen.

The Tristar etc at BA easily, and regularly flew over 30,000 

I said Shackleton, not Shackeng. A previous Avitar Shackeng used suggests he preferred 8 screws to 3 blow jobs :-)

IIRC some older aircraft were certified up to eithr FL450 or FL490 - I think Learjets and possibly early B-747's . The newer stuff struggles not through technical capability, but because regulations now give a time limit to get from maximum cruising altitude down to 18000? ft in the event of a sudden cabin depressurisation. Therefore most newer stuff, including all the Airbus liners, are only certified to FL410. AIUI.

Puhlease! 8 screws, PLUS, to borrow your somewhat crude analogy, 2 blow jobs.

[Shackeng]

The L1011 was certified to 420. If a/c weight and ATC permitted, we would ocsnly get up to 410, with OAT’s of as low, in my personal experience, as -67C. We would optimally fly at the highest level for fuel consumption, commensurate with the most favourable meteorological conditions, winds etc. conducive to the most comfortable ride and the best ground speed, and comfortably within our max allowable weight for the altitude to avoid being too close to “coffin corner”.  See Coffin Corner Aviation.

[Doctor Gollum]

That's most interesting. And timely... doing Modules 8 and 10 in July

[LC0112G]

Airliners at cruising height (FL300-FL410) normally report outside temps in the -50C to -60C range. -56C seems to be the most common one. I doubt a Shackleton bothered those altitudes very often though :-)

Haven't personally seen anything colder than -60C, but not saying it doesn't happen.

The Tristar etc at BA easily, and regularly flew over 30,000 

I said Shackleton, not Shackeng. A previous Avitar Shackeng used suggests he preferred 8 screws to 3 blow jobs :-)

IIRC some older aircraft were certified up to eithr FL450 or FL490 - I think Learjets and possibly early B-747's . The newer stuff struggles not through technical capability, but because regulations now give a time limit to get from maximum cruising altitude down to 18000? ft in the event of a sudden cabin depressurisation. Therefore most newer stuff, including all the Airbus liners, are only certified to FL410. AIUI.

China Airlines obviously didn't get that memo...

Their A350 flight from Taipei to Auckland is currently sat at FL420

Fair enough, the meetings I had at EADS were before the A350 first flew.

Incidentally, it looks like Sippy Cup Joe is slumming it at FL340 in his C32... A bit of a comedown from all the faff of his arrival at Mildenhall...

The C-32 wasn't carrying uncle Joe. He was on AF-1 (VC-25A 82-8000) which departed Geneva and headed West over France. AF-1 has had it's ADSB transponder turned off for the entire trip, so has only shown on tracking sites which support MLAT.

There were actually 2 C-32's which came over the UK last night -SAM18 (09-0017) which was the 'escape jet' out of Ramstein (and was also negative ADSB). SAM46 (09-0016) was the press barge (Geneva to Bangor Maine) which did have its AADSB transponder turned on, so showed on all the noddy tracking sites :-)

And then there was GRIM99.

[Doctor Gollum]

SAM46 didn't come anywhere near the UK... It left France just north of Bordeaux

Anyhoo, I quite liked the idea of Sippy Cup stuck in the non reclining seats in row 30

Most of the aircraft at or above FL410 were Dreamliners when I looked

[LC0112G]

SAM46 didn't come anywhere near the UK... It left France just north of Bordeaux

Anyhoo, I quite liked the idea of Sippy Cup stuck in the non reclining seats in row 30

Most of the aircraft at or above FL410 were Dreamliners when I looked

Fraid not. You've been listening to GB News too much  . Not my piccie, but...



SAM46 is the purple plane over Brighton. It entered UK airspace south east of Brighton, and tracked north westerly in a more or less straight line towards Dublin. It went Oceanic of the north west of Eire, en-route Bangor Maine.

AF-1, with Biden on board is the blue plane to the south of Brest. Grim99 is the blue plane to the south of Cork. SAM18 isn't showing, but it came into the UK over Clacton and headed basically due west and was about 20 minutes behind Grim99.

[STEMO]

All of this goes over my head. Geddit? Over my head 
Never mind 

[ronnyd]

All of this goes over my head. Geddit? Over my head 
Never mind 

 

[Nick W]

All of this goes over my head. Geddit? Over my head 
Never mind 

WHOOSH!


I'd give you the flight number, but it's in my anorak pocket...

[Doctor Gollum]

Perchance it wasn't SAM46 that I saw, but it was a C32 heading west from French France.

I only happened to be looking having been rudely disturbed by the Virgin flight to Lagos doing it's usual 10ft per minute* climb...

*a slight exaggeration, but it wasn't uncommon for the MedView Lagos flights to cross the coast below 11,000 ft due to their weight

[LC0112G]

Anyhoo, I quite liked the idea of Sippy Cup stuck in the non reclining seats in row 30

Not all B-757's are 'equal'. Plenty of interior pictures on the net of C-32A's although very few of the C-32B's

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/23087/usaf-upgrading-another-c-32-air-force-2-interior-for-16m-heres-what-the-first-looks-like

POTUS occasionally uses a C-32 at home and abroad if the VC-25/B-742 is a bit too big to get into the closest airport. IIRC Trump used one to get to Ireland the last time he was in the UK.

And "Trump-Force-1" is/was a B-757 as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_Force_One

The aircraft has two Rolls-Royce RB211 turbofan engines, and is configured to seat 43 people. It has a dining room, bathroom, shower, bedroom, guest room, and galley. Many fixtures are plated in 24k gold.

Not exactly cattle class.