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juliand | 3 years ago

It took them 2 hours and 40 minutes to complete the easter egg

discuss

alexose|3 years ago

More cynically: Roughly 2.4 tons of fuel, equating to 16.8 tons of CO2 emissions.

That's equal to the average CO2 emission of one US citizen per year. I don't think this is particularly noteworthy. There is a cost to this celebration, but that doesn't mean it isn't worth doing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territ...

usrusr|3 years ago

Yeah, this can't be some prank by a renegade flight crew, it can only be a farewell celebration act with a kick-off meeting, a budget and a dozen people who signed off. But I'm not criticising, by that measure we'd have to question any resource expenditure that exceeds the bare minimum for sustaining life.

stubish|3 years ago

Fun is a good thing to spend some of our CO2 emissions budget on. We need fun. A joyless society isn't worth saving.

kelnos|3 years ago

I was thinking along those lines as well, but:

1. For context, this was the final delivery flight of a 747, ever. It's a pretty momentous occasion.

2. If we're going to criticize something like this, then we probably should be criticizing a lot more about the waste in our own lives. Everyone generates a lot of unnecessary waste, even if we don't think about or consciously acknowledge it.

stanmancan|3 years ago

I have no clue what I'm talking about but this piqued my interest. If I ask WolframAlpha:

   Q:how many carbon molecules in 2.4 tons
   A: 1.092×10^29 molecules

X molecules of pure carbon carbon would theoretically require 2X molecules of oxygen to turn into CO2

   Q: how much does (10^29)*2 molecules of oxygen weight in us tons
   A: 5.827 tons

So 2.4 tons of Carbon + 5.827 tons of Oxygen = 8.227 tons of CO2? Maybe? What am I missing to have 2.4 tons of fuel turn into 16.8 tons of CO2 emissions? I'm not doubting it, and I'm sure it's WAY more complicated than above, but just genuinely curious!*

OneCommentMore|3 years ago

Yes. I agree. But it's a joke compared to what happened in Europe during the pandemic [0], when thousands of empty flights happened to secure their airlines landings slots. This could have been a checkmark in an Excel-sheet and did by far not draw the attention and ire of the public it should have last year.

[0] https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-business-hea...

rootusrootus|3 years ago

I think you misplaced a decimal point on that fuel tonnage, they probably burned around 27 tons of fuel for that pattern.

If my own napkin math and google searching is correct, the daily worldwide consumption of jet fuel is (in very round numbers) a million tons a day. A bit less than the total daily consumption of gasoline in the US.

ekianjo|3 years ago

Do you also track the CO2 consumption of all the guys who want to save the environment by going with private jets to Davos?

throwawaylinux|3 years ago

I wish to make a climate confession. I drove to the beach yesterday for recreation despite it not being necessary to keep myself alive and paying taxes to the climate gods. How many fraudulent carbon credits do I need to buy from rich people to absolve my sins?

slyrus|3 years ago

Or the average annual carbon footprint for one person in the US.

culi|3 years ago

Or put in another way, the equivalent of ~2.24 years of energy usage by the average US household