Category: Video answers

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Video answers: How airports make money

Here are the answers to last Friday’s video, enjoy!

Suggested ICAO level for video: 5+

  1. It’s privately owned so the government doesn’t own it.
  2. The break even point for per passenger revenue at Heathrow is $19 per passenger, or to put it another way, if Heathrow earns $19 per passenger that passes through the airport, they will be able to pay for their costs.
  3. Departing and connecting passengers are more valuable because they have more time to shop.
  4. Passengers spend most at retail stores, which earns Heathrow $5.15 per passenger.
  5. They spend more money because the airport encourages it by requiring passengers to pass through duty free shops before reaching their gates and also by not posting gate number until 45 minutes before a flight, which encourages passengers to stay in the central areas with shops. Finally, because Heathrow has many long-haul flights and a greater proportion of long-haul passengers are wealthier, they naturally spend more money.
  6. The average flight costs $9,500.
  7. On average it receives $29 per ticket.
  8. Because Heathrow needs bigger planes to make more money, it tries to encourage that, as a result it’s poorly connected to other domestic airports around the country.
  9. Most airports lose money because they’re government run and not very focused on making money.
  10. They do this because they see airport connections as having a positive economic benefit that they wouldn’t have without the discount for airlines.

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Video answers: Why do planes fly so slowly?

Here are the answers to last Friday’s video, enjoy!

Suggested ICAO level for video: 5+

  1. In 60s commercial aircraft began to break the sound barrier.
  2. Supersonic travel didn’t last because of the extremely loud supersonic boom and the inefficient use of afterburner engines that made them very expensive.
  3. They fly at between 900 and 930 km per hour.
  4. Nowadays modern planes are a little slower, but they’re wider, less noisy, more manoeuvrable, more comfortable, less expensive to maintain, more fuel efficient and cheaper overall.
  5. There’s no reason for them to fly faster. If they fly faster they’ll only arrive, on average, 30 minutes earlier at their destination. The downside to this is that they’ll be more expensive to operate.

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Video answers: The most valuable airspace in the world

Here are the answers to last Friday’s video, enjoy!

Suggested ICAO level for video: 5+

  1. Around half the world’s economic activity happens in these two regions.
  2. Russia lies between these two economic powerhouses.
  3. Travel between these two regions was very difficult during the cold war.
  4. They were able to connect Europe and Asia by flying via Anchorage, Alaska and thus avoiding USSR airspace.
  5. They saw a reduction of around 50% in the flight time between Europe and Asia by flying via Alaska.
  6. The fall of the USSR and subsequent agreement of overflight rights made travel between Europe and Asia much faster and convenient.
  7. Russia hasn’t signed this agreement because it wants to use its strategic position for political gain.
  8. Norwegian has tried and failed to gain overflight rights from Russia, which essentially prevents it from flying direct to many Asian cities.

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Video answers: The little plane war

Here are the answers to last Friday’s video, enjoy!

Suggested ICAO level for video: 5+

  1. They were both commercial failures with relatively few planes sold.
  2. Nearly 70% of the planes coming into London City Airport are Embraer planes.
  3. Due to noise restrictions, the steep approach angle and short runway, there are few planes that can operate there as efficiently as the Embraer.
  4. It’s a big market because there are many smaller airports which would be best served with regional jets.
  5. One of the test aircraft had an uncontained engine failure during routine testing.
  6. The financial support of the governments of Canada and Quebec helped to save the programme.
  7. They lacked an order from an American airline, which would make or break the programme.
  8. They allegedly sold 75 of their planes to Delta for below cost price.
  9. Boeing filed a dumping petition in US courts and the courts put a 300% import tariff on the planes.
  10. Airbus acquired a 50.01% stake in the programme.
  11. Airbus is a marketing powerhouse and can help sell many more planes than Bombardier alone. However, with final assembly taking place at Airbus’ assembly line in US, it means that the CSeries planes might be classified as US planes, avoiding import tariffs.

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Video answers: How to design impenetrable airport security

Here are the answers to last Friday’s video, enjoy!

Suggested ICAO level for video: 5+

  1. There’s no evidence to suggest that the TSA have prevented a terrorist attack.
  2. ICAO doesn’t offer suggestions on how to secure an airport, instead it defines objectives without suggesting how to achieve those objectives.
  3. It means that a place may look secure when in reality it isn’t completely.
  4. Israel has the best airport security in the world.
  5. It’s different because it is based more on the human factor than on scanning equipment (although they still use this too).
  6. Cars are checked before getting to the airport, plain clothes officers move around the check-in area and even before people check-in they pass through in interview which will determine their risk level.
  7. Young Arab men travelling alone are the highest risk group.
  8. After bags are checked in they’re placed in a pressure chamber which simulates the pressure on board an aircraft at cruise altitudes, the idea is to set off any explosives designed to detonate when a place is in flight.
  9. Air marshals are put on every flight.
  10. Flares are deployed if an incoming missile is detected.
  11. That’s hard to measure as Ben Gurion airport only has 20 million passengers per year and doesn’t deal with the volume of some of the bigger international airports. Racial profiling could not be used in other airports around the world as it is illegal.
  12. The number of people travelling has declined by 6% since September 11th 2001.
  13. It’s hard to know, maybe airport security works by deterring terrorists instead of catching them.

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Video answers: Why are aircraft always painted white?

Here are the answers to last Friday’s video, enjoy!

Suggested ICAO level for video: 5+

  1. They’re usually a green colour, which is from an anti-corrosive paint which is used.
  2. Approximately 1,100 kilos of paint is applied to an A380 in the paint shop.
  3. They’re inefficient because a detailed paint job adds unnecessary extra weight to a plane that causes it to burn more fuel as it flies.
  4. It cost them money because they had to frequently polish the surface to prevent it from degrading and becoming tarnished.
  5. It can easily reveal oil leaks, dents and cracks which may occur and be more difficult to spot with other colours painted on the fuselage.
  6. There is a rumour that a white paint job is less prone to bird strikes due to the higher contrast.
  7. It helps to keep temperatures down as white paint is twelve times more reflective than darker colours. This also helps reduce the thermal expansion of the plane and the associated stress placed on it.
  8. Concorde needed a unique type of paint that could deal with the enormous heat generated in the wings during flight.

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