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Cockpit Chronicles: Come along and enjoy the view
"Descend to 1-3-0." "Descend to 1-2-0."
I found myself listening to London Control while admiring one of the all-time greatest views I've ever seen.
"Slow to 220 knots. Fly heading 1-7-0."
As we banked to the right, I looked over my right shoulder at the London eye, a blue ferris wheel that stands out among the amber lights struggling for relevance against the sunrise.
No one should be up this early. Most of London is still asleep, and even if they were awake, they wouldn't be seeing the view we were witnessing. The lights of the city, the bridges crossing the Thames river and the sunrise that blankets the buildings with more light after every turn of our holding pattern makes me pause for a moment to realize just why this job is the most visually rewarding of any occupation.
As we turned to the right one more time, I began to ponder whether an astronaut would actually prefer the variety of these spectacular sights that a mere 'low-level' pilot can see.
A 777 ahead of us was still dark enough to cover the city lights. Even Mike, the captain with close to 40 years in the air, was taken by the scene. "That's just incredible" he said as the airliner banked to the right and peeled away from us a thousand feet below.
I had to resist the temptation to pull out my camera. I had taken some photos earlier, at 12,000 feet, above the 10,000 foot floor where we can't allow a camera to distract us during the more critical 'sterile period' of our arrival into Heathrow.
So often I wish I could save the five most interesting things my eye sees on a flight. I have to try to capture whatever I can and post them here or on Flickr.
It was a couple of well timed views like this that inspired me to post a picture from every flight with a small caption on a blog years ago. Then I'd write more. And then more. Finally leading to the Cockpit Chronicles.
It'd be so much easier if I could just bring you along in the cockpit jumpseat.
That morning I filmed a few clips while above 10,000 feet that are almost like being there. Here's what spinning around Guildford, England looked like.
Coming home from London, three and a half hours into the flight, we came upon a view I hadn't seen yet in the eight years I've been flying across the Atlantic.
Our route of flight was far more northerly–nearly 200 miles north of any track I'd been on, in fact. We would be crossing directly over the southern tip of Greenland. This time I'd be ready. Should the clouds allow, I was sure to get some pictures or a video clip of the landscape below. In the past, I've seen Greenland from 59 and 60 degrees north latitude, which put the ice covered island just off in the distance. Unfortunately, clouds usually cover most of the island.
This time we were at 62 degrees north, passing over jagged mountain tops that weren't obscured by clouds, but surrounded by silky glaciers that resembled low level cirrus clouds. In fact, it was hard to tell if the snow below was actually cloud cover.
The captain made a PA and I called back to our flight attendants. They needed to see this. A view of Greenland they'd likely never forget.
Of course, you're welcome to take a look as well:
A piloting career may not be what it used to be. Speeds have changed. The technology has changed. Security procedures and threats have changed. But one thing that has always remained remarkable in this job, even in my grandpa's era, has been the view. Those lower altitudes may be filled with more detail, but the higher flight levels can give a wonderful sense of perspective. And sometimes a little perspective is just what we need. I certainly got my fill on this trip.
Cockpit Chronicles takes you along on some of Kent's trips as an international co-pilot on the Boeing 757 and 767 based in Boston. Follow him on Twitter @veryjr
Filed under: The Cockpit Chronicles
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
bill Nov 17th 2009 5:42PM
Kent --
Good stuff.
Nice background tunes as well.
Sign Guy Nov 17th 2009 6:17PM
Great video! I really like your blogs. I wish it wasn't so long between postings. :(
Paul F Wotman Nov 17th 2009 6:30PM
Simply beautiful video ......and of course the music backround ...........Excellent !
I can't say it enough. ....... OH! Well written also .........
Jerome Nov 17th 2009 11:34PM
Awesome Kent!
Richard Nov 18th 2009 9:47AM
Kent
Great videos; thank you. Always enjoy your column. Keep it coming.
Nick Nov 18th 2009 4:32PM
I really enjoyed reading this awesome description of cockpit views of urban and natural landscapes. I so badly want to experience the cockpit view myself, but given the new regulations I doubt that would ever happen :-(
The video clips were great - especially the Greenland one.
Which bring me to two questions I have for you, Kent...
Few months ago, I flew on a 16 hr non-stop from Bombay (India) to JFK-NY (Delta, B-777). I monitored the flight trajectory on the seat-back monitor throughout and was amazed to see that the aircraft, instead of going a straight-line, took this big long curve over Central Asia, Russia, northern European countries, flying over Greenland, and then curving back down again over Canada and then finally the North-Eastern US. Why this deep northerly curve? To find favorable upper-level winds? Or that this route is actually SHORTER given the Earth's circumference increases towards the middle? Or both these reasons?
And question #2 (which is actually a peeve)... all window shades on that flight were asked to be closed just after takeoff (mid-night, local time) and stewardesses did not allow anyone to open it again until just moments before landing (9-ish AM, local time)!!! The reason? Opening the shades will bring in sunlight as we zipped through more than dozen timezones and mess up everyone's body-clock (you see, they were recreating daytime/night lighting in the cabin to match up with NY's local landing time - in order to "pre-condition" the passengers). But what about all those magnificent VIEWS we missed out on??!!
Thanks!
Mike Lane Nov 18th 2009 4:37PM
Your seat back map is flat, the world is round. If you traced your flight's path on a globe, you'd see that it was, indeed, the shortest distance. This is called a great circle route which means that the path you took followed an imaginary circle drawn around the earth which shares its center point with the center point of the earth. Though, that is assuming that you went pretty much direct and there weren't any countries that you couldn't overfly.
The projection they used to make the map on your seat back was a mercator projection. A great circle on a mercator projection looks a little like a sine wave. You can find out more about mercator projections on wikipedia: http://bit.ly/JQuvw
Kent Wien Nov 18th 2009 4:52PM
Thanks Nick,
To really get an idea of the route that's the shortest way to fly, take a piece of string over a globe between your departure and destination. Note how your track is much different from what it would be on a map.
This 'great circle' route is modified by dispatch a few hours before the flight by looking into the winds aloft to find the shortest wind route. A great depiction of that is here:
http://www.optimumroute.com/tutorial/tutorial_1.php
There are other considerations, such as overfly rights of some countries and excessive ATC fees for the use of certain airspace that require some deviation.
Also, twin-engine flights across the Atlantic and Pacific must remain within 180 or 207 minutes of a suitable alternate airport in case of an engine failure, which 'bends' the route to remain close enough to these emergency airports.
Nick Nov 18th 2009 6:16PM
Thanks Mike and Kent for your explanations! I found the links very educating.
Kent, about your cockpit jumpseat offer, I'm game anytime you get a chance!!
-Nick
Jorge Barba Nov 18th 2009 8:12PM
Amazing! Thank you for sharing what you see from the tip of a plane!
Ian Clarke Nov 18th 2009 4:32PM
This is great, but might I recommend re-encoding these using Vimeo? It is better quality and has no ads.
Julie Nov 18th 2009 5:16PM
"It'd be so much easier if I could just bring you along in the cockpit jumpseat."
Yes please! Haha. Thanks for the videos, those were great!
Brian Nov 22nd 2009 9:42PM
Thanks for providing a great view with a tremendous sound acccompaniment. It's always great to gain your view from the 'front' of the plane.
Jim Riggs Nov 30th 2009 2:32PM
Kent:
You certainly know much about the technical side of flying and the cockpit procedures, but your pictures and descriptions of what you are seeing also show me what an artist you are! Thank you for opening another door into the fascination we share of discovery and flying.
Doug Dec 9th 2009 9:57PM
have been lucky a few times to have seen greenland coming back from glasgow and prestwick back to toronto , it is quite the sight , looks so amazing at 35,000 ft , you can not explain it , something like the rockies in western canada or the alps in europe .
Rhys Dec 11th 2009 10:37PM
Hello, as a fellow aviator you would appreciate the gravity of what I am about to say: I JUST COMPLETED MY FIRST SOLO!!! Thought I would get it out there. I did it after waiting for a month for the UK weather to clear!
Kent Wien Dec 11th 2009 10:42PM
Congratulations! Welcome to the aviator ranks! Tailwinds!
Kent
Julian Dec 14th 2009 11:34PM
Hi Kent! love your blog! found this video, probably youve already seen it but anyway: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmTV6OvIgtQ , btw, try doing a video of your day, that would be nice!
Greetings from Costa Rica!
Kent Wien Dec 14th 2009 11:40PM
Hi Julian,
Thanks. Thanks for the link. That's actually the video I made for my daughter in 2004. It was taken off of YouTube after a rather successful week because of the U2 song. A year later lots of others (people I don't know) posted it (as if it were their video in some cases.)
Today my videos are only those shot above 10,000 feet during the non-sterile portions of the flight.
Julian Dec 15th 2009 8:57AM
Really nice video anyway! im taking my commercial licence at argentina, hope to meet u flying!