Contrails/Chemtrails from jets

**ChrisL** · 04-29-2009, 03:26 AM

Everyone has seen "Contrails (Condensation Trails) from jet planes. Apparently some people believe there is a distinct difference from a contrail that disappears very quickly and a "chemtrail" that lingers for hours and hours in the sky dissipating very slowly while it spreads out. Conspiracy theorists on this issue (I'm not one of them) believe there is something nefarious in regard to chemtrails.

Either way, maybe this year has been a drill year for the National Guard and Air Force, but I see more fighter jets and other non-commercial jets in the sky; or, maybe I'm just noticing them now and didn't really pay attention to them much before. I'm about 150 miles each way to two different National Guard bases.

Here's my question: Why is it that I can not recall seeing contrails/chemtrails from commercial passenger carrying jet liners?

Why to my recollection (I could be wrong) are they only given off by military aircraft? Because military aircraft fly at much higher altitude and the air temp/composition is such that it makes spent jet fuel look like that whereas lower altitudes don't produce contrails/chemtrails? Possibly. But, the military aircraft also fly at altitudes that I believe are in the same range as commercial airliners and you still see contrails/chemtrails from the military aircraft. I just had to pull over and snap a few pics a few hours ago when I was on the way home. These are lower altitude contrails/chemtrails that appear to have been in the sky long enough to where they're blending in to existing clouds:

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The chemtrail can be seen on the picture above running parallel with the power lines. It's hard to tell from the pic, but the chemtrail ran on for miles to the right of the pic and blended in with the cloud formation on the left and center of the pic.

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Within the last six months or so, on a weekend when I was spending a significant amount of time outside I noticed 10+ military jet higher altitude passes which created chemtrails. It's distinct in my memory because as the day progressed, the chemtrails ended up dispersing into cloudlike formations and at the end of the otherwise cloudless day, there was noticeable "cloud cover".

Chris L

**Quick Orange** · 04-29-2009, 04:41 AM

It was so they could be nefarious in the shade

**flyboy** · 04-29-2009, 06:17 AM

Finally a question I am qualified to answer!
I am already a jet engine mechanic and halfway through my commercial pilot education.

The contrail is basically the water that is produced in the combustion inside the engines (hydrogen from the fuel and oxygen from the air) that is cooled down and condensates.
How long they hang around depends a lot on the winds up there and the humidity, temperature and other factors.
There are contrail from passenger jets too. I guess one of the reasons that they might last longer could be that the military jet engines give off more carbon particles (soot) than the civil ones. I think it has got something to do with the loads military engines are put under they give them a richer mixture of air/fuel to avoid engine flameout during those loads. And at that altitudes those soot particles will work as condensation nuclei that causes water to condensate easier, so that might sustain the contrails to a certain degree.

It is way too late here, but I will def. look at this thread tomorrow.

**Bruno** · 04-29-2009, 09:57 AM

Originally Posted by flyboy

Finally a question I am qualified to answer!
I am already a jet engine mechanic and halfway through my commercial pilot education.
...

It is way too late here, but I will def. look at this thread tomorrow.

Thanks

I recently found out that there are conspiracy nuts who have wild theories about chemtrails, and how they are meant to control you and how a piece of copper wire can scare them away...

I know we have some conspiracy theorists on board here, but I hope that none of them actually believes the chem trail drivel.

**Rajagra** · 04-29-2009, 11:58 AM

Formula 1 cars have different emissions to road cars.
They are just different. Built differently, used differently and regulated differently.

A passenger jet will only "floor it" when taking off. Military pilots will be constantly doing the aerial equivalent of standing quarters, flat-out runs, doughnuts and handbrake turns. At least I would!

how a piece of copper wire can scare them away...

From that "ninjas are cool" page...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnM1G8S2uF4

**majurey** · 04-29-2009, 12:01 PM

Well, living in London you can imagine how crowded our skies are with traffic, what with the world's busiest airport as well as 4 other international airports nearby. As far as I can tell, the commercial flights all produce trails (I don't know if they're con- or chem-). Obviously this is hard to see on a cloudy day

, but with blue skies it's pretty obvious. With the correct conditions, London's blue sky often seems like a grid with all the trails hanging around.

**Rajagra** · 04-29-2009, 12:36 PM

Originally Posted by majurey

London's blue sky often seems like a grid with all the trails hanging around.

True, that. I had never even heard of contrails until a few years ago. I had grown up in London thinking they were just normal clouds.

**mparker762** · 04-29-2009, 01:56 PM

Commercial airliners also produce contrails. This does seem to have been more prominent a decade or so ago though. I can remember laying in the field with my binoculars mostly bird/squirrel watching, but also watching the passenger and military planes (B52s mostly) from Barksdale AFB flying overhead. Both types left big huge contrails, though the B52s left bigger ones. But both types would leave trails that could last for an hour or more on a still day. So the question in my mind is "Why don't they leave those massive long-lived contrails anymore". Maybe because the new planes are more fuel-efficient, so less particulates in the trail? This would be consistent with the explanation for why military planes still leave big long-lived contrails.

There's enough crazy stuff going on in the real world to be going about making up imaginary new ones.

**Del1r1um** · 04-29-2009, 02:22 PM

I got a book for a girlfriend one time that was called something like "UFO defense" (long story)... according to that book, contrails are part of the super secret, special handshake and codeword required, worldwide conspiracy fueled, earth defense system keeping us safe from ET.

**flyboy** · 04-29-2009, 03:54 PM

Here I am again.

First of: the contrails is mainly water, the soot-particles I mentioned is only a detail.
When you talked about how the military planes (B52) has got more of a contrail it is probably because the military planes are mainly using turbojets which is an old engine technology. The turbojet is capable of greater speeds, but is considerably less fuel efficient.
Newer airliners use a turbofan engine which is a lot more efficient and gives of less noise.

The reason the contrail sometimes takes a very long time to disappear is that some days the atmosphere has got conditions up there so that when the stripes are there they can not just evaporate again. On all the pictures in this thread there are high-altitude clouds together with the contrails. Clouds means the air cannot hold more water-vapor, so the contrails stay droplets for a long time.

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