Fuel is usually discharged to reduce the aircraft's weight to facilitate making a safe landing. The following situations illustrate some conditions when fuel discharging is necessary.
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Airlines find that fuel dumping can actually be cheaper than not dumping in certain circumstances. But it's not something pilots do on a routine basis. We spoke with Alison Duquette, spokesperson for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), who assured us that it doesn't happen very often.
Fighter jets are equipped with an automatic recovery system called Auto-GCAS4 (Automatic Ground Collision Avoidance System). This system determines if a collision is probable based on trajectory and speed.
The reason to dump fuel is simple: to drop weight. Any given aircraft has a Maximum Landing Weight (MLW) at which it can land, and in most cases that weight is lower than its Maximum Takeoff Weight (MTOW).
Just exactly how bad is flying really? Air travel accounts for 2.5% of global carbon emissions. In the US, flying accounted for 8% of transportation emissions, but less than 3% of total carbon emissions.