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Do commercial airplanes such as the Boeing 747 and 777 fill their fuel tanks to the fullest?

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Do commercial airplanes such as the Boeing 747 and 777 fill their fuel tanks to the fullest?

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My understanding is that they only load as much fuel as they need to give themselves a reasonable margin of safety to their destination and then some… the issue is that they don’t want to land with a heavy load of fuel for safety reasons — the plane is easier to handle without the extra fuel and of course a crash is more dangerous with lots of fuel onboard. Unfortunately, the ideal person to answer this question isn’t spending time on AB any more: Auntie Em. Her husband is a commercial pilot.

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That depends on the flight and the weather. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. A 747 or 777 going international, long haul with weather expected at the destination may have almost full or full tanks. A 737 or A320 on a domestic flight landing in good weather may have the minimum necessary for the journey. The “minimum” being defined as enough fuel to fly to the airport to which it is dispatched, plus fuel needed to fly to and land at the most distant alternate airport (where required for weather) plus enough fuel for 45 minutes at normal cruising fuel consumption after that. Also, the airlines sometimes DO chose to fill the aircrafts tanks with full (or very near) fuel even if it is not needed. This is called “tankering” it to the next destination. Tankering is usually done when the fuel is more expensive at the destination than where the plane departed, so the airline would rather take a weight penalty than pay the higher price. Firebrand said, “if they have too much for some reason they wi

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