The durations of commercial passenger flights are useful proxy data for the distance between cities. They easily debunk flat-Earth. Flat-Earthers invented “explanations” that different airplanes have different airspeeds to dismiss the data. In reality, all current long-haul airliners have a similar cruising speed.
Using flight durations to compare the distance covered by the different flights only works if their airspeeds are similar. And they are indeed very similar. Of all the current airliners with the range over 5000 km, the maximum difference of airspeed is only about 12%, which is between the slowest Airbus A220 and the fastest Boeing 747. If we only consider airliners over the range of 10000 km, then the maximum difference is only about 10%, which is between Boeing 767 and 747.
The discrepancy showed by the flat-Earth model far exceeds 12%, and therefore the maximum difference between airspeeds of 12% is sufficient to demonstrate that the flat-Earth model does not work.
The Airspeeds and References
- Airbus A220: speed 829 km/h, range 6300 km.
- Airbus A320: speed 829 km/h, range 6945 km.
- Airbus A330: speed 871 km/h, range 13450 km.
- Airbus A350: speed 903 km/h, range 16100 km.
- Airbus A380: speed 903 km/h, range 14800 km.
- Boeing 737: speed 838 km/h, range 7130 km.
- Boeing 747: speed 933 km/h, range 14320 km.
- Boeing 757: speed 854 km/h, range 7250 km.
- Boeing 767: speed 850 km/h, range 1220 km.
- Boeing 777: speed 892 km/h, range 13649 km.
- Boeing 787: speed 903 km/h, range 14140 km.