Record-Breaking Jet Stream Accelerates Air Travel, Flight Clocks In At 801 MPH (cbsnews.com)

pgmrdlm quotes CBS News: On Monday night, the river of air 35,000 feet above the New York City area, known as the jet stream, clocked in at a blazing 231 mph. This is the fastest jet stream on record since 1957 for the National Weather Service in Upton, New York — breaking the old record of 223 mph, according to NWS forecaster Carlie Buccola. This wind provided a turbo boost to commercial passenger planes along for the ride. With the help of this rapid tailwind, Virgin Atlantic Flight 8 from Los Angeles to London hit what could be a record high speed for a Boeing 787: 801 mph over Pennsylvania at 9:20 p.m. Monday night...

"The typical cruising speed of the Dreamliner is 561 mph," CBS News transportation correspondent Kris Van Cleave points out. "The past record for the 787 is 776 mph set in January 2017 by a Norwegian 787-9 flying from JFK to London Gatwick. That flight set a record for the fastest subsonic transatlantic commercial airline flight -- 5 hours and 13 minutes, thanks to a 202 mph tailwind."
FlightAware, a global aviation data services company, reminds CBS that even a 100 mph increase in the jet stream can shorten a flight by an hour.

Comments

Idle speculation

[93 Escort Wagon]

Of course, that could mean flights going the other direction will be *delayed* by an hour or more - either because they’re heading into the strong stream or because of the extra distance routing around it.

I wonder if flights being an hour early creates headaches for air traffic control and gate management at the destination? It’s great for the passengers though.

Re:Idle speculation

[supernova87a]

Airline planners would likely have the routes deviate in the opposite direction to not be flying in the strongest part of the jetstream, so it's not an equal advantage / disadvantage for both directions.

You may be interested to see the jetstream maps for how wide it typically is: generally several hundred miles wide

Re:Idle speculation

[Solandri]

Flights in the other direction can usually be re-routed to a different altitude or route where the jet stream is not as strong. Likewise flights in the same direction as the jet stream can be preferentially routed to take advantage of it it's strong.

I was on a flight from Asia to the U.S. which benefited from a particularly strong jet stream and arrived 3 hours early (11 hours instead of 14 hours). For that, we were punished by having to stay in the plane at the gate for nearly 2 hours, since the Customs and Immigration employees hadn't yet arrived for work that morning to process arrivals. I would imagine it's the same for domestic flights if there's insufficient room at the gates. The plane would probably have to stay somewhere on the tarmac until a gate opened up. I suppose that objectively it's slightly better for the passengers (same amount of time aboard the plane, but it's quieter). But subjectively, it's rather frustrating knowing that you're already at the destination, but are prohibited from deplaning by logistics.

can't even help people understand?

[supernova87a]

This article didn't butcher it too badly. But still there's a layer of education opportunity that was missed.

It wouldn't take more than 2 sentences to include an explanation about ground speed versus air speed. Not even talking about the differences in airspeed at different altitudes and densities, mach, etc. But I guess even that is too much for our technical details-allergic media.

Faster Than Sound!

[crow]

That's significantly faster than the speed of sound! Sound travels at about 660 mph at a 787's cruising altitude. Of course, sound travels through the air, so the plane wasn't actually breaking the sound barrier, as the air speed was below that, so it wasn't really hitting Mach 1, but I suppose if the plane were to suddenly dive out of the jet stream into relatively still air, it would have done so; I wonder how well it would have handled the stress?

Re:Mach 1.044

[tsqr]

Mach number is the ratio of the speed of an object thorough an air mass (aka, airspeed) to the speed of sound through the same air mass. The speed of sound you cite is the speed of sound in dry air at 20 C. Since the airliner was flying at 35,000 feet, or 10.7 km, we can assume (using the standard lapse rate of 6.5 C per kilometer) a much lower temperature of approximately -50 C, and thus a significantly lower speed of sound.

Having said all that, it is meaningless to speak of Mach in relation to ground speed. Note the quote from TFS: "The past record for the 787 is 776 mph set in January 2017 by a Norwegian 787-9 flying from JFK to London Gatwick. That flight set a record for the fastest subsonic transatlantic commercial airline flight -- 5 hours and 13 minutes, thanks to a 202 mph tailwind."

Buh Metric anyone?

[Billly Gates]

I and the world have no idea how fast or how high up that is. Scientist should be using the Metric system like everyone else which makes it easier to understand and do calculations with.

Didn't I see this before?

[roc97007]

Wait, didn't I see this somewhere before?

Welcome to the world of aviation units

[virtig01]

In aviation -- almost everywhere -- feet is used for elevation, miles are used for distance, and knots are used for speed.

NYC ??

[Tom]

the river of air 35,000 feet above the New York City area, known as the jet stream

That's a way to describe a planet-circling phenomenon, if you are one of those morons whose map of the world has written "here be dragons" on everything outside the USA.

It's not a way to talk to an educated audience like /.ers who know, many from first-hand experience, that places outside the three locations Hollywood places movies in actually do exist.

Especially in a story that doesn't make sense unless you understand the actual reach of the jet stream.