60 cents a mile

The Eclipse 500's first actual flight, scheduled for late July, will be a milestone for the aviation industry, provided Raburn and his 180 employees can deliver on a bunch of brash promises. The 500 will sell for less than a million dollars - unprecedented for a private jet - and be capable of flying from New York to Dallas nonstop. It will be equipped with a pair of the smallest, quietest, most fuel-efficient turbofan engines ever built for a commercial aircraft, allowing the Eclipse to fly at a cost of less than 60 cents a mile - cheaper than any jet in existence, cheaper than any twin-engine turboprop or piston-powered plane, cheaper, in fact, than a New York City cab. The cabin will accommodate as many as six passengers, including the pilot, who will face a dashboard featuring three color screens - no old-school dials or gauges - that will show weather, terrain features, other planes, and nearby airports, all overlaid on a graphical moving map.

If the 500 flies this summer, and then wins certification from the Federal Aviation Administration, Raburn believes the new plane could do for private flying what the Apple II did for computing - wrest it out of the hands of hobbyists and make it accessible to the average person.

via jrobb

Here's a little thought experiment -- an economic test. My family (of four) will fly on vacation from Seattle to Delaware in August. We just bought airline tickets that cost us $300 each round trip. We fly from Seattle to Pittsburgh, switch planes and go from there to Baltimore. A crazy, cramped, unpleasant day, to be sure. But for $1,200, a pretty good value.

How would the trip pencil out via Eclipse 500? Let's see:

Wired quotes $0.60/mile, but the Eclipse website quotes $0.56/mile. Let's be conservative and call it $0.60.

How far? I can't really go by frequent flyer miles. Google helped me find the latitudes and longitudes, along with a great circle distance calculator.

These tell me:

                                       Lat.         Long.       GC Distance   
Depart:      Seattle-Boeing Field      47° 32' N    122° 18' W
Refuel:      Bismarck AP (S)           46° 46' N    100° 45' W  1,009 miles
Destination: Wilmington AP             39° 40' N     75° 36' W  1,350 miles
                                                                -----------
Total:                                                          2,359 miles

Time and Money

Wired says the Eclipse 500 cruises at 405 mph. Let's say that -- with takeoff and landing -- it averages 350 mph. This amounts to 6:45 in the air to go 2,359 miles. Let's assume that it takes an hour to land, and refuel the plane in Bismark, so we're at around eight hours door-to-door. This is at least equivalent to, if not better than the commercial flight.

Verdict: time is a win.

How does the money side compare? Using a $0.60/mile operating cost, the flight cost us $1415. Takeoff and landing fees probably cost us another $200 (total guess). And then there's the pilot. Hmmm. Another guess: $250 an hour. This comes to $2,000. Then there's the capital cost to consider. Depreciate $837,500 over -- say 10 years lifespan and 300 flight-days per year and you end up with $280. Double that for fun and come up with $560 for our jaunt. Total it all up? $4175. One way. $8,350 total.

Verdict: money is a loss.

This is the seventh year in a row that we've taken this trip. We've paid up to $700 per ticket in the good (for the airlines) years. I just checked on Expedia, and for a non-red-eye flight, no weekend stay, not purchased in advance, they want $1332 per seat. That ate up a lot of the difference.

And let's say that I join an air-taxi co-op. I get together with a few dozen folks and we collectively promise to purchase 5,000 hours of flight time per year. That might bring our pilot cost down to -- say -- $125 an hour and our capital cost down from $35 an hour to $20 an hour.

With those factors, my flight costs $5,350.

I wouldn't go for that. Not yet. But it's no longer out of the question. And technology certainly has the potential to send the pilot part of the equation down to zero. This brings up lots of issues, but it also brings down the cost to $4,350. And by eliminating the human pilot, it now becomes a 6-passenger plane. $725 per seat.

Very interesting.

Whither Boeing and the airlines? Wither, methinks.   

Where's Dave?

Seems I'm the last person to figure out what's been going on with Dave Winer. Scripting News has looked like this...

...for a week.

Turns out Dave has been in the hospital for a week. Ouch.

Twenty or thirty years ago, a week in the hospital was fairly routine, but in the name of efficiency, US hospitals routinely kick new mothers out less than 24 hours after delivery. And many procedures are performed on an outpatient basis. No overnight stay at all.

A little over 4 years ago, I spent a week in the hospital. I had toughed out what appeared to be a bad stomach flu a little too long and thus allowed my swollen, infected, inflamed appendix to burst. Not recommended.

They had me in for a week because I needed serious-ass IV antibiotics and narcotics. They also needed to make sure that all systems were go, after the laparoscopic appendectomy.

We still haven't heard what Dave's in for, but it sounds like he's on the mend and that's a good thing. But it must be something serious, otherwise, he'd be home and blogging right now.

And if my appendicitis recovery is any guide, I would expect it to take 6+ weeks to get back to 100%.

Dave's done wonderful things for my productivity and my brain. He's made my life better. Thanks and get well soon. We miss you!