Im sure everyone who is flying with real world weather with winds aloft are noticing ridiculous winds at upper levels. There is no real program yet that accounts for this and balances what would be the premium altitude as per your aircraft and its fuel burn.

 

Ive noticed the winds are really strong and relatively close 100kts-140kts from FL260-FL400. So is there a proper manual method to find out what altitude would be best to fly at? Those winds crosswind or headwind really eat up fuel, but there must be a grey area as to flying higher for the thinner air as opposed to the extremely strong winds. Obviously weight would also come into play.

 

PFPX when it comes out along with the proper aircraft data of fuel burn should address this question.

 

For the sake of being subjective with all the aircraft, lets just stick with the NGX for the above problem as that what I fly as well as MD-11

Winds are normal for this time of year - welcome to the jet stream. :rolleyes: It's pretty easy to find an altitude in the US and Europe - weather services provide maps of winds aloft at various altitudes. For trans-oceanic flights or other long hauls you can even take advantage of pressure patterns and get favorable (and fast) winds a fair part of your flight by taking non-direct routes. It's pretty much up to you whether or not it's worth it for any given flight.

 

DJ

Seems that would be true with tail winds, but anything right now heading in any kind of a westerly direction is getting hammered.

When you go here http://www.aviationweather.gov/adds/winds/ the winds are pretty much the same on the upper levels all over from the mid west to the east coast in particular. So there is really no non direct route if you went say from KATL to KORD. So better to fly high or or lower to get somewhat lower winds was really the question.

Im sure everyone who is flying with real world weather with winds aloft are noticing ridiculous winds at upper levels. There is no real program yet that accounts for this and balances what would be the premium altitude as per your aircraft and its fuel burn.

 

Real world dispatchers do this. No program that I know of that simulates this, but maybe PFPX will offer something when it releases.

Currently flight aware is the closest to getting accurate flight levels for the current weather.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone...typing errors imminent

Thanks.

 

Doesnt seem to be a real answer. Too many variables. The example flight above on flightaware lists most of their Flight levels at "FL260-FL280."

P{retty vague with a value like that.

So some seem to prefer the somewhat lower winds relative to thinner air but very strong headwinds. Perhaps its more of a company procedure in these flight conditions?

Thanks.

 

Doesnt seem to be a real answer. Too many variables. The example flight above on flightaware lists most of their Flight levels at "FL260-FL280."

P{retty vague with a value like that.

So some seem to prefer the somewhat lower winds relative to thinner air but very strong headwinds. Perhaps its more of a company procedure in these flight conditions?

 

That's a summary section. You can see a list of filed flight plans per city pair with airline, aircraft type, and filed altitude.

I always take the latest filed altitude since I use real weather.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone...typing errors imminent