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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDear Mitt: I thought you would know this, but here's why airplane windows don't open.
(DUers: I finally realized that I/we are dealing with an infantile personality.)
Mitt: The reason airplane windows don;t open is twofold.
1. The air noise would be horrific. You'd never be able to hear the sound on the movie.
Or the PA announcements.
This is the explanation I think you're most able to understand, so I put it first.
2. OK, this one involves aerodynamics and physics, so it will take a little more concentration on your part.
Aerodynamics is all about what makes an airplane fly and what happens to it, both inside and outside, when it does.
Physics is about why and how the physical world works.
Remember Newton and the apple?
Yeah, like that.
An airplane's inside air is pressurized. That means that it's kept at a higher pressure than the outside air. I won't try to explain how. it just happens. Trust me.
Why? Because as you get higher the outside air gets 'thinner' and there's therefore LESS oxygen in it. So you have to keep the inside air 'thicker' with more oxygen in it. Otherwise you'd pass out from lack of oxygen. It's a big word...'hypoxia'', but you don't have to remember that.
Until you get to about 10.000' you're OK with outside air. It's thick enough. But ABOVE 10,000' the air starts to get thinner so that's why they pressurize the inside air to make it thicker.
OK?
NOW...if you should open a window at say 35,000 feet ALL the INSIDE high pressure air would try to get OUTSIDE, and all the OUTSIDE air would try to get INSIDE.
Right away you'd notice that you couldn't hear the movie any more. And any papers you had out and your laptop would go with the inside air, OUTSIDE.
Bummer.
This is called an "EXPLOSIVE DECOMPRESSION".
And that's a bad thing.
If you're the guy who rolled down the window you'd probably lose a body part, or be sucked out of the airplane, if you didn't have your seat belt fastened.
That's why it's always a good idea to have your sea belt fastened.
Just in case you're on an airplane where the windows roll down.
33Greeper
(188 posts)The real October Surprise is the IRS Amnesty for Mittens' UBS Swiss Bank Account.
Betsy Ross
(3,147 posts)Reading your remark just gave me the best thrill I've had in years. If only the IRS story in October on top of all this. The implications for the future of the GOP are spectacular. Be still my beating heart.
liberal N proud
(60,335 posts)cognoscere
(461 posts)greatauntoftriplets
(175,742 posts)where the villain got sucked out of an open airplane window or door? Anyway, that's how I knew what would happen.
Rmoney's explanation is stupid.
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)A Boeing 737 belonging to defunct Aloha Airlines had a hole rip open in its fuselage mid-flight. A flight attendant was sucked out of the plane to her death.
bluesbassman
(19,374 posts)They must've been examing it because there was no tarps covering it. Got a picture of it somewhere.
greatauntoftriplets
(175,742 posts)I remember the episode. Guess that escaped Rmoney's notice, not that that's difficult.
Arugula Latte
(50,566 posts)&ExactW=620
Hissyspit
(45,788 posts)panzerfaust
(2,818 posts)Interesting, as the 737 holds the world's record for deskinning incidents.
Boeing says that the thicker "upgauged" skins are not because the previous skin was too thin - no, it is simply because the new engine configuration on the 737MAX requires it.
Given the very slight difference in the engines, somehow this has a hollow ring to it.
In any event it will likely be 2018-2020 before the new guppies hatch out. Meanwhile, if flying on a 737, might want to bring along a roll of aluminum wrap for in-flight repairs.
And keep those windows closed!
pangaia
(24,324 posts)Not many of those left and I doubt any are actually in scheduled passenger service, certainly not in any 'industrialized' country.
tclambert
(11,087 posts)However, Mythbusters busted this as a myth. The air pressure differential just isn't strong enough to pull a big, fat guy like Goldfinger out a little, tiny aircraft window.
Hissyspit
(45,788 posts)greatauntoftriplets
(175,742 posts)Good theater anyway!
Merlot
(9,696 posts)Who of rmoneys age hasn't seen that movie?
Hassin Bin Sober
(26,330 posts)... but survived thanks to the flight attendant hanging on to his legs while the plane landed:
progressoid
(49,991 posts)Metro135
(359 posts)That's how Goldfinger met his (timely) end in the movie of the same name.
October
(3,363 posts)wherein character "Joe Patroni" (miraculously NOW a Concorde Captain) opens the window and fires a flair or something...
I remember being so insulted by that scene.
Concorde...Airport 79, I think.
The original was meticulous in research of airlines, airline personnel, etc.
pangaia
(24,324 posts)Someone around here has posted a link to the scene when he gets sucked out.
BTW, in my not-so-humble- opinion Sean Connery was the ONLY James Bond.
But that's for another election. :>
TheOther95Percent
(1,035 posts)SNL is going to do a skit on the windows thing.
Brother Buzz
(36,442 posts)pinboy3niner
(53,339 posts)MerryBlooms
(11,770 posts)MindPilot
(12,693 posts)Or you'd owe me a keyboard
Kalidurga
(14,177 posts)NBachers
(17,119 posts)That was soooo funny.
-..__...
(7,776 posts)DollarBillHines
(1,922 posts)BOISE, Idaho -- A flight nurse was sucked out of an airplane at 20,000 feet when the window he was sitting next to suddenly blew out. He was left dangling in the sky, forced to battle 200-miles per hour wind and fight his way back into the plane.
For flight nurse Chris Fogg, June 27th is a day he'll never forget. It began as a part of his routine, transporting a patient to a Seattle hospital aboard a twin-engine piper turbo prop.
But while the plane was cruising at 20,000 feet, disaster struck.
"It was just a big loud bang, a big pop right next to me," Fogg said.
more... http://www.komonews.com/news/8346067.html
Cha
(297,280 posts)actually very Lucky at the end of that day!
That and his headset and his body weight! Scary!
krispos42
(49,445 posts)...and difficult to seal airtight.
Now, they could make windows that open inward, so that as the plane pressurized as it climbed it would become unopenable, due to the air pressure on it.
But having a 400 mile an hour blast of air through the window while you're below 10,000 feet (either climbing or decending) would be horrifically windy and noisy.
Likewise, waiting on the tarmac for your turn to take off would be ear-splittingly loud as plane after plane pumps tens of thousands of horsepower worth of turbine noise into the air as they went to takeoff power.
Like pretty much all right-wing ideas, it's STOOOPID.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)....if you look you will see it is actually two layers of plastic. There is a small hole in each to allow the pressurized air to flow through.
Think of it this way, say the outside is at 10 psi and the inside is at 20 psi. Instead of having a single layer with the difference of 10 psi on it you have a slight leak that provides pressure between the two layers so the chamber in the center between them is at 15 psi.This makes it so each layer is only subjected to 5 psi.
The numbers I used are just for illustration. Actual sea level is 14.7 and at 30,000 feet it's 4.3. Still, a difference of about 10 psi which doesn't sound like much until you measure it per square foot. You multiply by 144 which works out to 1,440 pounds.
cyglet
(529 posts)very, very cold, even in summer. Even if the air weren't thin, you wouldn't want it open.
trof
(54,256 posts)dflprincess
(28,079 posts)If I could have, I would have been tempted to open it - and even then I probably wouldn't have gotten cool enough. (One of my friends resorted to rolling down all her car windows - in January - in Minneapolis and she still felt too hot.)
pre-menopausal....
Was it -20 January or January thaw? (I live in St. Paul FWIW)
dflprincess
(28,079 posts)not as cold as it could be, but pretty chilly with the windows rolled down.
The funny thing was, she pulled up at stop light and the woman in the car next to her had her driver's side window down. They laughed at each other.
beachgirl2365
(111 posts)PLs, PLS, PLS roll your window down Mitt,.........oh, please, please, please,.... just say it's a science experiment,.. please let us know what happens,................... Ok?
bluemarkers
(536 posts)don't play well together
This is the reason the oxygen masks didn't drop.
kaboom
Liberalagogo
(1,770 posts)if you left the window open, gremlins could get inside the plane.
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PatrynXX
(5,668 posts)not everything on a james bond film is absurd
albeit give the size of the window how he didn't punch a hole in it I have no idea..
MindPilot
(12,693 posts)Even if the air outside the plane were pure oxygen, it wouldn't do you any good, because there would be still be insufficient pressure to push it into your lungs.
cyglet
(529 posts)that we're dealing with W from another mother....
trof
(54,256 posts)I'm truly gobsmacked by his statement.
We need a face palm or head smack smilie.
greatauntoftriplets
(175,742 posts)This one might be appropriate, too.
tavalon
(27,985 posts)Separated at birth?
pangaia
(24,324 posts)This guy makes W look like Stephen Hawking !
Bernardo de La Paz
(49,002 posts)valerief
(53,235 posts)mysuzuki2
(3,521 posts)if they did all the kids on the plane would be playing with the up/down switch the whole flight. That would be even more annoying than the constant whining and crying.
cyglet
(529 posts)kicking your seat the whole entire flight (and I'm always doing the international ones)...
mysuzuki2
(3,521 posts)graham4anything
(11,464 posts)btw, the movie Arthur Hailey's Airport" shows what happens if the outside air is suddenly entering the plane after an explosion
Ask Dean Martin's favorite stewardess in the movie (or Van Heflin's character)
(this is the movie Airport, not the later spoof Airplane)
clydefrand
(4,325 posts)horse fly all the way to England on top of their plane??? My, it must have huge lungs!!!!!!!!!!
Ah, that is why her horse didn't win. I get it now! I'm gettin' old; I just can't think like I used to...ah, when was that?
SemperEadem
(8,053 posts)and religion in the church.
kathman-duzi
(82 posts)tclambert
(11,087 posts)Are you trying to trick me into believing in evolution? I suppose next you're going to claim global warming isn't a hoax made up by Al Gore in order to hurt the oil industry!
A HERETIC I AM
(24,370 posts)A 1970's & 80's porn star.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyapatia_Lee
Which is SIMILAR to hypoxia and evolution, in that shortness of breath was involved and the evolving of orgasms kicked in.
OK...it's late.
jmowreader
(50,559 posts)If the windows rolled down, how would the people on the ground know what snakes were on the plane?
hedgehog
(36,286 posts)on the people below.
valerief
(53,235 posts)deafskeptic
(463 posts)It's too bad we can't can't drop things down on the Republicans. It's all random
valerief
(53,235 posts)Normal people ask, "Why aren't planes made so they won't burn?"
Of course, we know the answer to the latter question. Regulations.
Politicalboi
(15,189 posts)With windows rolled down on plane.
Lex
(34,108 posts)That, or Obamacare.
BlueStreak
(8,377 posts)Do the words "Payne Stewart" mean anything to you Mitt? Ask your country club pals.
HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)Miami4Obama
(41 posts)I started watching them in the late 80s and i love all of them! All airplane movies I watch, I just love them.
truedelphi
(32,324 posts)Have been a lot more fun to have him become the first Presidential Candidate EVER to be done in by Explosive Decompression!!
SpankMe
(2,957 posts)Far be it for me - a liberal DU'er and anti-conservative - to say ANYTHING to mitigate any and all well-deserved criticism of Romney and his Satanic campaign brood, but...lets not get so cynical as to look like a liberal version of Freepers.
Romney never said anything about "rolling down" airplane windows. When he said "...the windows don't open..." that was his little clueless way of referring to some sort of passenger-initiated emergency exit capability through a window (sort of like we see on some buses where you can push windows out as a means of emergency escape).
His statements about oxygen are equally as unsophisticated, but seem to point to a basically correct perception that an airplane cabin is a sealed, air-tight vessel that could become oxygen deficient if people couldn't create an opening somehow. If his statements have been quoted correctly, he really doesn't say anything about opening windows in flight. His thoughts aren't TOTALLY crazy; they're just expressed as a second grader would express them.
I'm not being an apologist for this mind-numbingly insulated, elitist cad. But, we (liberals and DU'ers) are doing exactly what conservative knuckle-draggers do whenever we make a statement slightly less than artfully (like the 'clinging-to-their-guns-and-religion' comment, which was completely true but was attacked relentlessly by morons).
Bocks Car
(25 posts)trof
(54,256 posts)But you nailed it with the 'second grader' comment.
I would posit that most folks who have ever flown on an airliner have at least a vague understanding of what would happen if airplane windows could be opened.
Something bad would happen.
"Rolling down" was my interpretation.
Rmoney just said "Open".
Windows in cars 'roll down', so that's the analogy I chose.
Nit picky.
Don't shoot the messenger.
allan01
(1,950 posts)nitwit . here is a purrrfect example of explosive decompression.
Effects Of Explosive Cabin Decompression On Crew
This shows a passenger can be ejected by explosive decompression, that is why the B-29 had a cage to keep crew from being shot out is explosive decompression occur
Bocks Car
(25 posts)But then I don't fly it much above 5 or 6 thousand feet high.
CubicleGuy
(323 posts)... we answer Mitt's questions about why you can't open windows in submarines.