12/05/2020
I did not write this - but an aviation guru did and it has been fact-checked by multiple sources. So just a little FYI to debunk the common myth about “recycled airplane air”.
Here goes ....
Ok, here’s my aviation related contribution to stemming the panic about this virus. How germy is the air in an airplane? Awful right? It’s a flying petri dish with 150 people trapped in a metal tube re-breathing the same air for hours, right?
NO!! NO, NO, NO, NO, NO……HECK NO!!
Truth is, the air in a commercial airplane is probably the cleanest air you’ll breathe ALL DAY. Here’s why.
Airplanes need to pressurize so you can still breathe when you’re at high altitude. To do this we need to pump lots of air into the cabin to get it to the right pressure. Where does this extra air come from? The outside. And where are you when we pump this outside air into the cabin? Usually very high, well above any city pollution below. That’s clean air up there.
The engines which are constantly gulping down enormous amounts of air every minute and spitting it out the back at high speed to provide propulsion, also supply the air to the cabin. Some of that high-pressure air is tapped off the engines, cooled, filtered and delivered to the cabin. No airplane is airtight, and air from inside is constantly leaking out of all sorts of places. In addition, every airplane has one or more relief valves that vent excess air to the outside. That valve is constantly moving throughout the flight to release excess air, because the engines are constantly pumping in new, fresh air. If there was no relief valve the plane would over pressurize and crack.
Yes, some of the cabin air IS recirculated within the cabin. It’s drawn out of the cabin, run through air filters, and sent back to the cabin. But remember, the plane is constantly leaking old air out, on purpose, and the engines are constantly pumping fresh, clean air in. So while some of the air you breathe is in fact, old air, it’s still filtered and it is constantly supplemented and replaced with fresh air.
I read a study years ago that I should have saved, and now I’m too lazy to find it again. They looked at air quality in commercial airplanes and basically found that in every case the air in the cabin was far cleaner than the outside air, with one exception. That only exception, where their tests of air quality failed, was when the airplane was PARKED AT THE GATE WITH THE DOOR OPEN!
So can you get sick on an airplane? Sure. If you’re seated right next to someone who is sick, you may catch it, but this is no different than standing in line at the grocery store, sitting in the waiting room at the DMV, or sitting in a classroom. Proximity to sick people increases your risk for getting sick.
At least on an airplane, the air you breathe, which may have some germs from the guy in the next seat, is probably still a lot cleaner than the air at the DMV as it’s being cleaned every 6 minutes.
