Just wondering if this is a common thing people do lol. Saw a flight to Ireland was an ATR-72, a prop plane. so I chose another flight and I got an A320 instead
Yes, yoy are. But so what? You’re not hurting me with your weirdness, so go hard,
Sounds like your basing this on a new tech vs. old tech? Not looking at safety rates?
You can achieve airspeed at 35 mph in a small enough craft. A propeller plane is simply slower. Airplanes as a whole are extremely safe. Turbulance is normal and not a sign of the aircraft failing.
The ATR-72 has jet engines. It’s just that the turbine spins a prop instead of compressing air for direct combustion.
The biggest indicator of safety is if you’re flying to/from Newark.
If you can’t see the propeller spinning, how do you even know the engine is working?
Not necessarily. Depends a lot of the reason behind your choice. Propeller aircraft are usually slower and more noisy, so if those are your reasons, then that’s fair enough.
They are, however, generally also smaller and turboprops are great for short flights, so they have their niches.
I fly both relatively often. My local airport is serviced exclusively by DH Dash-8, so I take those flights to get to the much larger regional airport around an hours hop away.
I mean that style of plane is better for the environment. I would understand a small like 4 seat prop plane. But jets have no better chance of staying aloft than an ATR-72. As long as they are maintained at the same level as the jet.
A320 seat configuration is 3-3. ATR-72 is 2-2. I’d take a guaranteed not-middle-seat any day.
Answering the titular question, I personally don’t find it weird that someone might avoid certain types of aircraft, in the same way that some people strongly prefer certain aircraft. For example, the big windows and the more-comfortable pressurization of the Boeing 787 is appealing for some. But alternatively, some might prefer the modern Canadian design of the Airbus A220.
Objectively speaking, though, propeller planes is a very wide category, and I’m curious which specific aspect you want to avoid. Piston-powered propeller craft are basically non-existent in commercial passenger airline service, with the exception of small “puddle jumper”, 15-seat air taxi services. Such airplanes tend to be loud and also use leaded gasoline – hilariously still called “low lead” despite apparently having more lead additive than what motor gasoline had in the 1980s.
Then there are turbo prop aircraft, like the ATR-72, which are basically a propeller taking power off of a jet engine core. No lead here, and noise is slightly less bothersome due to continuous jet combustion, but the sound of the propeller remains. Though this is offset by the lower cruise speeds, so less “wind noise”.
If perhaps the concern is about propeller failures, bear in mind that commercial passenger aviation is exceptionally safe, across all aircraft types. The propulsion method is small-fries compared to the backend support and logistics of an airliner and ATC, plus having two pilots, and all manner of other things which blend into the background but are essential for safety. Pretty much only the elevator would be safer than air travel, even accounting for some rather unfortunate recent incidents here in USA airspace.
That said, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that propeller and jet fan failures have had fatalities in living memory, with a notable event being the blade ejection of a Southwest Boeing 737 that pierced the fuselage and partially ejected a passenger.
Overall, I personally have zero qualms about commercial passenger propeller aircraft, and up until the Boeing 737 MAX fiasco, most people did not care at all which type of airplane they were boarding. Since that event, booking websites added filters to allow excluding specific types of aircraft by model. But I’ve not seen one which excludes by propulsion type.
If you are flying over water, avoid single engine planes.
ATR72 looks like a twin.
I have only flew on planes once when I was immigrating to the US. I haven’t flown in a plane for a while, but I would not want to ride in any Boeing planes right now.
Its fine, everyone has different preferences.
Flew in a 737 yesterday. Only issues were the asshole sitting next to my wife (got seated in different rows) and the fact that the pilot didn’t turn the AC down and everyone on board was sweating profusely by the time we got to our destination.
It should still be very safe. But with the recent Boeing 737 MAX autopilot causing crashes, and then a lot of news worthy Boeing plane failures, plus the shitty press Boeing executives they’ve been getting, and also the US also under an administration that loves deregulation, as shown with the ATC failures causing plane crashes, I just have no confidence anymore.
I don’t want to fly in a Boeing, nor in US Airspace at all. So omenous, don’t wanna get final destination’ed
Autopilot crashes?
You mean MCAS (Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System)?
It’s not autopilot. It’s worse than that.Due to the larger engines needing to be mounted in a different place, the flight characteristics changed between previous gen 737s and the new 737 MAX.
The characteristic change would mean it needs different certification from air authorities and existing 737 pilots would require recertification to be able to fly the new 737 MAX (which is supposed to be just an updated model).
All very expensive for what should be merely an upgraded model.To avoid this, Boeing used software to change the characteristics in order to bring it inline with previous 737s and the existing certifications.
And as it was just an augmentation system, it was deemed high risk but not critical risk. As such, it didn’t require full redundancy, didn’t require Quick Reference Handbook entries incase of issues/errors, and didn’t require training.
In fact, pilots had no idea it existed, what it could do or how it worked.Which means when it had an issue and caused extreme pitch down due to faulty sensor readings, the pilots had literally no idea what was happening as they were trying to stop the plane from accumulating pitch down every 5 seconds.
And then Boeing tried to fuck with the narrative. I think they also didn’t tell pilots about MCAS until after the Ethiopian Airlines crash (the 2nd caused by MCAS), but I’m not 100% sure on the timeline.
Boeing has had a stream of QA issues, the way MCAS was handled was idiotic, they are a shitty company.
But I have no issues flying in a Boeing.
I don’t like or trust the company, but I trust the air authorities. And most of all, I trust the pilots.
Turboprops are no less safe than your typical turbo engine. If that’s your concern, then I would suggest reading up on how they work just to ease your mind a bit. They are loud AF though. If that’s your issue, then ANC work well, but outside of that, a different flight may help.
Why do you avoid them?
They turn into spaghetti at speed. Watch them on video to see the TRUTH!
Unreliable!
Have you been weezin’ da juice?
Yes, because there is really no reason to avoid either I can understand having a preference or a dislike for props, but not really to avoid them.
Unless, of course, you clarify why.
So if we’re being real, a jet engine is basically a super high rpm propeller that’s enclosed in a cowling. If anything the stress it’s under makes it more prone to failure. I could see avoiding single prop aircraft, which for pretty much all passenger flights would be propeller driven. But honestly any aircraft would be fine for me provided it has an experienced human pilot and at least 2 engines.
Weird that you feel the need to specify that the pilot be human.
What do you know that we don’t?
I know at least one person like that. They won’t outright avoid prop planes, and they know its illogical, but the idea of flying on one still makes them nervous.