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Airbus Investigates Flying in Commercial Formation
To save fuel. The idea - act like a flock of birds. Severa spoke city’s (London Paris Madrid) rendezvous and fly formation over the Atlantic before reaching NYC. This will save fuel on the flight.... they’re gonna have to get a lil better with on time performance to make this work..lol (www.cnn.com) Más...Sort type: [Top] [Newest]
So, several large jets have to circle until the formation can be made. How would that save fuel?
So, we just had a story about two high time commercial airline pilots that could not fly an ILS and now we expect them to fly close enough to reap the airflow benefits? cool.....
Yeah no doubt...lol. In the test program they’re talking about eventually having flight cpus similar to the ata refueling ones to do this procedure. Would be between 1.5-3 nm off the vortex.
Yeah, what could possibly go wrong with this plan?
Bah, Airbus computers will handle it all...
I totally missed that – do you mind linking to the squawk?
The article quoted Dr Sandra Bour Schaefer, CEO of Airbus’ fello’Fly:
"They will be 1 1/2 to 2 nautical miles away from the leading aircraft, and slightly offset, which means they are on the side of the vortex. It's no longer the vortex, it's the smooth current of rotating air which is next to the vortex, and we use the updraft of this air."
Taking advantage of the free lift in this updraft of air is called "wake-energy retrieval." Bour Schaeffer says that upcoming flight trials using two A350s could prove that on long-haul flights, fuel savings of between 5% and 10% may be achieved, "which is an enormous number. This is the reason why we want to accelerate it. It is not a product today, but it is something we strongly believe in."
"They will be 1 1/2 to 2 nautical miles away from the leading aircraft, and slightly offset, which means they are on the side of the vortex. It's no longer the vortex, it's the smooth current of rotating air which is next to the vortex, and we use the updraft of this air."
Taking advantage of the free lift in this updraft of air is called "wake-energy retrieval." Bour Schaeffer says that upcoming flight trials using two A350s could prove that on long-haul flights, fuel savings of between 5% and 10% may be achieved, "which is an enormous number. This is the reason why we want to accelerate it. It is not a product today, but it is something we strongly believe in."