A drop in the bucket!

I was bothering the wife the other day and came up with this:

A 747 jet airliner holds 360,000 lbs of fuel. That is equal to roughly 58,000 gallons of Jet A.

The same 747 can travel 8,400 miles on one "tank" of fuel, the whole 58,000 gallons worth.

So in two days, the 747 can go from Miami to LA, back to Miami then half way to LA again before it is empty.

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My wife's car averages 23mpg city and highway mileage combined and holds 18 gallons of gas.

She drives 12,000 miles a year on average, and uses about 500 gallons of gas in one year.

If she were to drive from the time she was 17 and lived to be 100, she would use 41,500 gallons of fuel during her lifetime if she drove 12,000 for 83 years.

I don't think 500 gallons would get the 747 out of the terminal and down the runway to complete the take off!

That is just one plane, two days and 58,000 gallons gone. I don't feel bad putting gas in my car or driving around, or think that we are going to be short on energy soon. Me putting in 10 gallons to drive for the week is like a drop of water in the ocean.

Yeah but a normal 747 holds 350 people, if you divide that 58,000 gallons of fuel it works out to each person using 167 gallons of fuel.

Now I dont know about you but there is no way any of my cars can go 8400 miles on 167 gallons of fuel.

My galaxie can go 220 per tank of gas thats 22 gallons, it would take 381 gallons of fuel to travel that distance.

Now that is at 4$ a gallon for fuel it would cost me 1524$ for that trip, not counting for time. You figure even if you have 2 other people in the car to help driving and you drive 24/7 you might might be able to complete the journey in 2 weeks. A jet can do that trip in one day, while you get to look at the flight attendants ass and sip on some coke.

Aircraft are more efficient then most people realize, also I realize you may have just been posting something funny or whatever, and I don't mean to flame just wanted to post something back.

And don't forget that they use kerosene as well.

I wonder what kind of milage the old piston engine planes got?

If the plane didn't have to take off it could travel twice as far. In other words from an air refueling.