How quickly can a plane descend?

Airliners can descend over 8,000 feet per minutes if needed. A descent from 35,000 feet at that rate would have you down to 11,000 feet in 3 minutes or less. John Cox is a retired airline captain with US Airways and runs his own aviation safety consulting company, Safety Operating Systems.



People Also Ask

In modern aircraft with modern avionics, the descent profile is automatically calculated by the computers. When prevailing winds are entered the flight management system can accurately determine the top of descent and the rate of descent that is required.

MORE DETAILS

The short answer is no, and rest assured that the pilots know how uncomfortable turbulence can make passengers feel. And know that no aircraft has ever crashed because of turbulence. Turbulence has not caused an airplane to crash, Biddle said. Airplanes are built very sturdily.

MORE DETAILS

Yes, an aircraft can stay in the air without going forward if the oncoming wind, called headwinds are equal or greater than th minimum speed of that aircraft. This principle is used in the wind tunnels to experiment the flight characteristics by blowing the wind to the aerofoil and assess the aerodynamic changes.

MORE DETAILS

The first indication to passengers that a plane is descending is the reduction in engine power, but that might not mean the aircraft is slowing. The most comfortable and quiet way for pilots to reduce the speed of a plane during the stages of descent is to level off briefly.

MORE DETAILS

The airplane accelerates to rotation speed, but it's still on the ground. Obviously, some airplanes will lift off more quickly than others. Generally speaking, though, the takeoff roll lasts about 15 seconds for single-engine general aviation airplanes.

MORE DETAILS

In aviation medicine, the 1% rule is a risk threshold that is applied to the medical fitness of pilots. The 1% rule states that a 1% per annum risk (See also risk management) of medical incapacitation is the threshold between acceptable and unacceptable.

MORE DETAILS

Turbulence is a sudden and sometimes violent shift in airflow. Those irregular motions in the atmosphere create air currents that can cause passengers on an airplane to experience annoying bumps during a flight, or it can be severe enough to throw an airplane out of control. (The pilots) aren't scared at all.

MORE DETAILS

While pilots can't actually see turbulence, they often know what is coming up, thanks to reports from other planes, weather reports, and radar equipment. However, clear air turbulence (severe turbulence occurring in cloudless areas) can sometimes catch pilots off guard.

MORE DETAILS