The Airbus Fellow’fly Project

We all know that airplanes must fly maintaining a distance between them of several miles for safety reasons.

But we also know that when birds make migration flights they do it together. And it has been seen that the air generated by some takes advantage of the others and that way they can fly with less effort.

Well, that’s what the Airbus people try to achieve, that two planes can fly closer so that the air currents generated by one benefit the other and thus they save fuel consumption.

The idea seems good, although as always the problems are in the small details. As the most important factor is to maintain the safety of flights when two planes (or more) fly nearby and at speeds close to 1,000 km / h.

At that speed a plane travels 1 km in just over 3 seconds, and 3 km in about 10 seconds.

Flying two planes with 300 passengers over very short distances so that one takes advantage of the turbulence created by the other is not easy.

And they have to see how they have to fly so that the turbulence of the flight does not disturb them.

It is one thing to have an idea when watching the birds fly, and another very different thing is to do it with two airplanes weighing more than 100 tons and with more than 300 people on board.

In the previous photo we see how the birds fly

And in the next photo how they will try to fly the planes in the future

But despite the obvious difficulties, it is a subject to study and test.

Today the technology allows to have very precise position data so that two planes can fly somehow closer.

If they could fly closer, the airspace would be much better used, and possibly the flights could be the “direct” ones, which would cover less space, and then flights would take less time and could also consume less.

There are obvious advantages in the idea, but putting it into practice will take a long time and many tests.

The “problem” that is difficult to solve in the flights of large airplanes is that its polluting effect can be reduced very little, and I hope that over time people will be sensitized to fly less and for reasons of “real” needs, not only for having fun

Flying 70 years ago was something “chic” and novel, and if people become mentally aware of the climate problem we have, it should become something “polluting” and harmful, and something to avoid if possible.

The twists and turns of life.