Why London's Heathrow Airport Sometimes Hosts 'Ghost Flights' With No One on Them (jalopnik.com) 117
An anonymous reader writes: Six times per week, an empty plane used to fly from London's Heathrow Airport to Cardiff, Wales. The next day, the plane would make the return trip without a single passenger. Half As Interesting, the second channel from Planelopnik-approved Wendover Productions, details why ghost flights like this sometimes operate from Britain's biggest airport in his new video. Despite being one of the most crowded airports in the world, Heathrow operates with only two runways. As a result, it's extremely difficult to get a "slot pair" -- rights for airlines to land and take off at a certain time. Only 650 slot pairs exist per day, so airlines are prepared to drop massive cash in order to get prime slot pairs. And they can trade and sell them, too. [...] Should an airline fail to use their slot at least 80 percent of the time, Heathrow will reassign it to the next company on the waiting list.
I'm taking bets (Score:3)
Want to bet that we'll see this pop up in some chemtrail conspiracy video within a day?
Re:I'm taking bets (Score:5, Insightful)
I had never heard of such a thing until a couple of months ago when someone posted on Nextdoor that there were a lot of 'chemtrails' that day. I corrected him that condensation trails was condensed to 'contrails' and for my trouble got a wild rant about what a naive fool I was to not know about how my mind was being controlled by government spraying. It seemed to me in his case more medication was needed.
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His mind snapped from the constant attempts at control by advertisers.
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Re:I'm taking bets (Score:5, Informative)
Re:I'm taking bets (Score:5, Funny)
The problem with the chemtrail apparatus is not just the tanks, which require lightening the passenger load but the dispenser heads attached to each engine. In-flight turbulence causes the feed to become uneven. That's why in the bad-weather Midwest you get towns that totally swallow the Illuminati conspiracy to the extent that they have Knights Templars parades down Main Street, while the next town over will totally reject the conspiracy.
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I don't know how well-known this is, but from 2005-2008 the valves in the chemtrail dispersal equipment used by about two thirds of the airlines, was cheap shit made by some Chinese company. (This stuff isn't FAA-approved because that would require disclosing its existence, but on the upside that means there are many more bidders and it was really quite competitive. Even the "juice" was cheap as long as you weren't too much of a Nazi about consistency.) The valves would jam often, or spill way-too-high conc
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MOD UP. (No points, but everyone "in the biz" needs to read this important testimonial)
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And even though chemtrail fluid is made from domestic StarLink corn, Monsanto's sale to Bayer complicates the manufacturing process. EU agents have now infiltrated the company and could at any time stumble upon the genetic engineering process by which the corn is used to produce the midichlorian-infused fluid.
Re: I'm taking bets (Score:4, Informative)
The problem with many of these conspiracy theories is that they often ignore details like logistics which are required to make everything run every single day. Let's take the example of chemtrails.
The premise is that it is a wide conspiracy that commercial airliners are used to spray extremely potent chemicals into the air at 30,000+ ft. This is extremely unlikely given the many groups that are involved in just loading the chemicals in a plane.
Of those four groups of people, ground personnel and maintenance may not even work for the airline and are mostly likely airport employees and some may be government workers and possibly union workers. So just to load an airplane with chemicals require multiple groups which are private and public employees and may be part of unions to turn a blind eye or outright hide the process.
Add to this (Score:2)
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You're making assumptions on how the system works. It's actually beautifully simple, as the chemicals are mixed right into the jet fuel. Thus, you don't really need any special equipment on the airplane, as the chemicals are stored right in the fuel tanks and dispersed per the normal operation of the aircraft. Their is no separate tanks, and the ground crews and pilots have no need to know about the system at all.
You mean the extremely volatile jet fuel? What's the mix of fuel and chemicals? By you definition of "normal operation of the aircraft" you are asserting that dumping the fuel (which the plane needs to fly) is the only way to get the chemicals out. First of all, now you are further diluting the chemicals by mixing them in the fuel. Second the dumping of fuel is something that pilots and crew and passengers would tend to notice. Third, it doesn't reduce the need for fuel to carry extra weight but it complica
Re:I'm taking bets (Score:4, Funny)
Sounds like that guy opened his mind so wide that his brain fell out.
Not a "conspiracy" it's a consipracy. (Score:1)
Want to bet that we'll see this pop up in some chemtrail conspiracy video within a day?
See, the Deep State has been using them to fool all of us into thinking that there's plenty of air traffic and subsequently the economy is doing great. Of course, add in the bogus unemployment figures too boost people's confidence in the economy.
Now, exactly who does benefit from an un realistic view of the economy? Yeah, retailers and consumer durable makers like washing machines.
But WHO exactly NEEDS to have a confident buying public? WHO needs folks to throw caution to the wind and buy their pr
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Dude, those flights aren't empty. All CIA alien renditions between Area 52 (not Area 51, everyone knows about that false flag operation), and the Thai Cave Black Ops facility (why do you think there were so many International SEAL's in the area) use Heathrow as a stop over.
CAPTCHA = "staged", see The Slashdot Oracle knows the Truth.
FUBAR (Score:3, Funny)
HA! Trick question. All isms suck.
Re:FUBAR (Score:5, Funny)
Please explain to me again how Capitalism organizes the economy for the most efficient use of resources.
Because lower-case letters actually cost more.
Re:FUBAR (Score:5, Insightful)
A Capitol idea, comrade! (Score:5, Insightful)
You are correct. True Capitalism would encourage one or two companies to purchase all the slots, and gouge travelers once it had a monopoly on the airport. Unregulated capitalism that only considers pure supply and demand generates its own friction. (In this case in the form of resistance to true competition) I could probably make a pretty solid claim that every sort of economic model has similar levels of overall friction, and that one of the interesting ways of comparing systems would be to analyze where that friction would lay.
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Yes, the airline industry is a natural monopoly industry. High barriers to entry and very low incremental costs, coupled with network effects. We would end up with one airline and super high prices to fly.
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Capitalism would have the owners of the airport determining if that was the case or not.
Some airports may run on a daily/hoursly rental (like a hotel)
Some may run run on a monthly/yearly/many year lease (like a rental)
Others may sell the slots to the current owner with conditions (like Heathrow does, or a condo)
There's benefits to both parties for longer term contracts (for example selling permanent access allows long term planning on the part of airlines, and helps get immediate money for funding the build
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I have no idea why "true capitalism" would require auctioning off every departure time. Buying all departure times from now until forever is definitely something capitalism supports.
which would be a nightmare (Score:2)
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True capitalism would have the airport auction off EVERY departure time
Not at all. The airport deciding how to sell it's slots has nothing to do with a political system that allows private ownership. What you are describing is a perfect market a concept nothing at all to do with political structure of company/resource ownership.
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You're making the wrong assumption. Capitalism doesn't create the most efficient use of resources. Capitalism does create a more efficient use of resources then Socialism. The prime point, at which resources are used most efficiently will be somewhere in between these two extremes.
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who said anything about efficiency
Um, you did.
Please explain to me again how Capitalism organizes the economy for the most efficient use of resources
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No government involved. Unlike most US airports, Heathrow is a purely private company. Slots are sold to airlines as a purely commercial transaction, with a long waiting list. (And, no, they wouldn't be auctioned off in some sort of unregulated capitalist environment: every company has to build a relationship with its customers if it wants to keep them as customers, so taking slots away from airlines, or trying to charge them more for slots would drive airlines to competitor airports, such as Gatwick. We as
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It defines efficiency as capitalism, circular logic.
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Please explain to me again how Capitalism organizes the economy for the most efficient use of resources.
Because if London had true capitalism, Heathrow would have ten runways. That way, British Airways would have a place to stack up all its delayed flights.
Re: FUBAR (Score:2)
Efficiency (Score:2)
There are quite a number of ways to measure efficiency, and you're only focusing on one.
1) Given the Rules, this is efficient. The rules may be dumb, but that doesn't negate them.
2) Price stability is another form of efficiency. Given #1) this helps provide efficient pricing model.
3) I'm sure there is a great deal of pressure for more runways, but I am equally sure there are all sorts of rules and pressure preventing additional runways from being built. Likewise, Additional Alternate Airports are not likely
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Each airline should bid a number of passengers they think they can fly during that slot pair (paying a set amount per each passenger they bid). If an airline's actual number of passengers drops below 80% the next highest bid, then the sl
Huh (Score:1)
The actual reason is because of identity politics. There are people in UK who identify as Ghosts, and therefore there need to be ghost flights to satisfy the politics of inclusion.
I hear Zombie flights are also coming up, and also Attack Helicopter flights, and also special planes outfitted with fake grass flooring, wood walls, and plenty of greenery for treesexuals.
But your car is destroying the environment (Score:5, Insightful)
Amazing that the carbon footprint of unnecessary jet fuel expenditures isn't even brought into question.
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And why would it be? Airlines have to report CO2 emissions and the programs they use to get them down. Also you can drive from Cardiff to Heathrow in about 2hours. That very short and very light plane trip can probably be done daily for a year before it even compares to one inter-continental flight.
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It absolutely is. It's only a five minute video.
It's about three minutes in.
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USPS/FedEx/UPS as airline (Score:2)
Passengers aren't required on some flights... they just move letters and shipments. Also, if a population is moving, sometimes there's nobody on the return flight for months... think Boston to Florida.
So, we've got half a story here.. this must be a SlowNewsDay.
Flawwed system? (Score:2)
Incentivizing flying empty planes to earn $$$ trading slots!
650 slot pairs exist per day, so airlines are prepared to drop massive cash in order to get prime slot pairs. And they can trade and sell them, too. [...] Should an airline fail to use their slot at least 80 percent of the time...
So why not recover more revenue from users? Add some additional rules to prevent congestion by empty planes: Should an airline fail to use their slot at least 80 percent of the time not counted as used when the p
wait, what? (Score:2)
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Cardiff airport also has a large BA servicing facility.
And this seems to be the real reason for these flights. BA is moving the aircraft overnight to their hangars and service facility at Cardiff, and carrying out a positioning flight in the morning so that they are in position for the next day's timetable. Positioning flights like this are common even at airports that aren't slot restricted.
Seems a bit daft.... (Score:2)
Or at least seriously suboptimal. Instead of flying empty planes, Heathrow should charge a "non-usage fee" which is a few thousand dollars less than the "ghost flight" costs.
More or less cost neutral to the airline; raises some income for Heathrow ... and saves the jet fuel, wear and tear ...
Notice the lack of an answer in the summary? (Score:1)
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Not sure if the summary was edited after you post, but the "use it or lose it part" is right there -- the last sentence of the summary.
Landing fees? (Score:3)
Make them outrageously high. But discount the actual landing fee by dividing it--or somehow scale it down--by the number of "souls" on-board. Eventually some bean counter will wonder if it's actually worth it to be hanging on to those slots that are not being used by actual fare-paying passengers. Perhaps the airports could do the same with jet fuel and make fuel cost more when it's used to fly an empty aircraft. It's seems to me to be the height of stupidity to burn up fuel--fuel that the airlines are constantly complaining is too expensive--to fly empty planes.
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Take-off fees, yes; but not landing fees. We don't want pilots pressured into choosing a riskier landing due to fees. I'm picturing a scenario where they don't want to divert from bad weather because their alternative field has a high landing fee and management is breathing down their necks about it whenever they land there.
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Dagnabit indeed. Maybe they should only pay the fees associated with their "home field" regardless of where they take off or land. I'm not sure if that closes all the loopholes. The devil's in the details; but their ought to be some way to structure fees so that it doesn't influence safety decisions in any way....
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That mechanism is called Tickets. The "souls" pay money for them, and they offset the costs of the landing fees.
And gasoline! No passengers in your car? 10x the cost. Surely you're willing to employ that sort of rule in your own life...
Interesting - and happens all over the world (Score:2)
I seem to remember reading or watching a program that described this happening elsewhere. Maybe Hong-Kong. Apparently there's politics involved too with those who own the slots and renting them out. The airport has lost control over who lands in a slot. There were a bunch of small private jets that wanted to gain access and are having issues - but the slots are being sold to the highest bidder. Plus have a long lead time.
Unused slot pairs? Obvious solution -- overbook! (Score:4, Insightful)
Time for Heathrow to overbook the slot pairs then, just in case some airlines don't really use them. Airlines ought to appreciate the treatment, considering how familiar they are with the process!
Interesting until it gets preachy (Score:1)
This video is interesting until it gets preachy about climate change enviromentalism tell other people what to do with their planes bullshit.
Perfect set for the movies! (Score:1)
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Notice the lack of a question mark in the summary? That means it wasn't a question.
A question would be: "Why Does London's Heathrow Airport Sometimes Hosts 'Ghost Flights' With No One on Them?"
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Betteridge's corollary of headlines: if the headline doesn't ask a question, then you have to make up your own question, and then answer it with no.
Q: Why Does London's Heathrow Airport Sometimes Hosts 'Ghost Flights' With No One on Them?
A: No.
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Re: Answer (Score:2)
Then don't count empty flights as valid flights. That would put an end to that habit.
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Re: Answer (Score:4, Informative)
I suspect that the problem with building more runways is acquiring the land from the people who live or have businesses on the land. that could get expensive
There's currently a fight going on over the construction of a 3rd runway. The House of Commons last month voted approval but local officials including London's mayor are contesting it and asking for a judicial review.
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Then don't count empty flights as valid flights. That would put an end to that habit.
No it would just lead to as many people being paid to ride along as necessary, further increasing the waste (i.e. extra fuel cost). The cost of holding on the slot will ultimately be covered by the sale of the slot to another airline (or the money saved by not needing to buy the slot from another airline when you need the slot for a directly profitable flight.
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No it would just lead to as many people being paid to ride along as necessary, further increasing the waste (i.e. extra fuel cost)
Since a full plane covers not just overhead but per-passenger fuel costs with ticket sales, even one (paid-ticket) person on the plane would be a net gain for fuel costs. Having to staff the plane with anyone but a pilot would raise costs - that's the likely reason. It's almost certain that there would be buyers on these flights if tickets were offered.
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It seems the easy solution would be if the airline isn't using enough of their slot, but is close enough, allow them to pay a fee that would let them keep the slot. Set the cost of the fee to be slightly below the cost of running a ghost flight. Use the money to fund infrastructure improvements.
Re:Answer (Score:5, Interesting)
Who-knows-how-much jet fuel being wasted, adding to the price of tickets... CO2 being generated... And I'm getting bitched at for wanting a fucking straw.
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To answer your question: "The oldest drinking straw in existence, found in a Sumerian tomb dated 3,000 B.C.E., was a gold tube inlaid with the precious blue stone lapis lazuli.[1]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drinking_straw [wikipedia.org]
And here to save you the trouble of looking it up is the referenced source article: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/11/the-amazing-history-and-the-strange-invention-of-the-bendy-straw/248923/ [theatlantic.com]
Now let's get back to the subject of why these airlines are permitted to wa
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And I'm getting bitched at for wanting a fucking straw
And so you should. I hope you also get bitched at for conflating two very different problems with very different consequences and very different solutions under the banner of "pollution".