Weird air traffic question.
It's a shot in the dark, I know, but on the off chance someone here knows...
I am tracking a flight from O'Hare to Detroit. Instead of flying straight, the flight went due north until inside Wisconsin, then flew in a wide arc until flying down into Detroit. And there are no thunderstorms in the area.
Why not 'as the crow flies'?
Flight%20tracker- Try asking Kyle Richards. I think she owns the plane.
- Because it's flying over a large curved sphere, not a flat map.
If you have a globe, try tracing a straight line between Chicago-Detroit, then trace an arc that goes north. You'll see it's actually shorter to "work with" the curvature of the earth.
- thanks r2! When i have watched other flights, the route seems much more 'crow flying' straight, though. What about the fact that it went due north for at least 200 miles before heading east?
- Besides what R2 said, other things like weather and availability of clear airspace, especially around larger airports are the reason. If they want to time a window to land better they may take a slightly longer route, that way they don't have to keep circling and congesting the busier airspace around the airport.
- Clearly you should've chosen to fly with Old Crow Airlines.
- Also, the weather and winds configure into the equation.
