My flight just announced that it will be pretty empty, and that it is important for everyone to sit in their assigned seats to keep the weight balanced. What would happen if everyone, on a full flight, moved to one side of the plane?

Question

My flight just announced that it will be pretty empty, and that it is important for everyone to sit in their assigned seats to keep the weight balanced. What would happen if everyone, on a full flight, moved to one side of the plane?

In: 8623

Answer 1

It’s not side to side you have to worry about, it’s front to back. There’s something called weight and balance that is calculated for every flight of every aircraft with passengers, even small Cessna 172s. Airplanes need to have the weight centered around the middle (chord) of the wing because very bad things can happen if the center of gravity is too far off.