Transport
Discover facts about transport. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
Transport
Airports use dogs to chase birds off runways
Dogs patrol the runway and make birds feel that a predator has moved into the neighborhood. Birds that scatter are less likely to meet an arriving aircraft,…
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An aircraft door can remain dangerous even after the plane has landed
Residual cabin pressure can force a door open violently when it is released. Airbus uses a warning light to alert ground staff and crew to that risk. Being…
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First-class cabins use heavy curtains for isolation
Heavy curtains block sightlines and absorb some cabin noise, giving first-class passengers a softer boundary from the rest of the carriage. It’s privacy by…
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Luggage gets misplaced mostly during terminal transfers
At a terminal transfer, luggage leaves one plane and gets routed to another while passengers rush through the airport above it. A short connection turns the…
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How luggage handlers stop suitcases from shifting
Handlers pack bags into cargo containers and secure them with nets or straps, so a turn or bump doesn’t send the pile sliding across the hold. The luggage…
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Commercial drones require strictly filed flight plans
Commercial drone operators map their route and check airspace before launch, then secure authorization for controlled zones. A tiny aircraft still shares the…
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Why planes use different altitude layers
Planes flying opposite ways use different cruising altitudes, so one stream passes above the other instead of head-on. The sky gets traffic lanes without…
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NASA's Opportunity crawled 28 miles across Mars
Opportunity moved slowly because its solar panels had to gather power between drives, and every turn across rocky ground needed careful planning. The rover…
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Cassini's first dive between Saturn and its rings found surprisingly little dust
Engineers initially used the spacecraft's large antenna as a shield because the particle environment was uncertain. The first pass revealed a region much…
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Why some airports keep beehives
Bees visit flowers across a wide area, then bring pollen and nectar back to the hive. Testing those samples gives researchers a living survey of local plants…
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Baggage carousels are built to run either way
Manufacturer Daifuku offers clockwise travel as well as its standard counterclockwise layout. Even the overlapping carousel plates can be reversed to suit the…
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Ham the chimpanzee pulled levers in space
Ham learned to pull a lever when a signal light appeared, earning a food reward for the correct response. The test checked whether a trained task still worked…
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Armstrong left the overshoes that made his Moon footprints behind
The treaded lunar boots went over the boots built into the spacesuit. Apollo 11 left those outer overshoes on the surface along with other equipment to reduce…
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The shortest flight path can look curved on a map
A flat map stretches a spherical world, so the shortest surface route between two places often appears to bend toward a pole. Stretch a string across a globe…
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Check-in luggage scales receive daily recalibration
Staff test the scale with a known weight and adjust it if the reading drifts. A few seconds with a calibration weight beats charging someone for an imaginary…
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Domestic flight routes operate as essentially straight lines
Airliners follow routes that trace the shortest path over Earth’s curved surface, called a great circle. Flatten that globe onto a screen and the straightest…
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Your seatback map hides the turbulence
An airline's passenger map is designed to show progress along the route, not the aircraft's complete weather picture. Pilots use separate forecasts, reports,…
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Probe Juno studies the deep interior of Jupiter
Juno maps tiny changes in Jupiter’s gravity as it sweeps past, then uses those clues to infer the planet’s hidden layers. Its microwave instrument also reads…
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Electronic luggage tags use low-energy digital ink
Electronic luggage tags use e-paper, whose tiny particles stay put after the image changes, so the display needs power mainly during updates. Your bag keeps…
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Chang'e 4 was the first spacecraft to land on the far side
The Moon blocks radio signals between its far side and Earth, so Chang’e 4 relied on a relay satellite beyond the Moon to pass messages along. The lander…
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Pioneer 10 is currently heading toward the star Aldebaran
After its Jupiter flyby, Pioneer 10 kept moving along a path aimed toward Aldebaran. With no engine firing to change course, the probe is now the ultimate…
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Commercial helicopters follow distinct routing corridors
Helicopter corridors give pilots mapped routes through busy airspace, with designated altitudes helping keep aircraft apart. The sky looks huge from the…
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Airplane overhead bins have curved interior ceilings
The bins curve up into the space beneath the airplane’s rounded ceiling, using the cabin’s odd-shaped overhead gap for luggage. A square box would waste that…
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Why passport stamps glow under UV light
Some passport stamps use fluorescent ink that looks ordinary in daylight but glows under ultraviolet light. The hidden mark gives inspectors another detail to…
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