This article about airline window seats got me wondering. I believe I have read some articles about this before but I don't remember where. https://www.newsweek.com/skin-care-dermatologist-tips-traveling-plane-health-risks-spf-1795974 Are some types of available windows better than others?
Living in Colorado, sunblock with SPF 9000 is standard equipment. My parents lived in Phoenix for 40 years....both had much darker sun tans on the left arm just driving a car. It's not just airplanes.
It’s common knowledge that UV exposure increases with elevation. The standard windows found in our little airplanes and even commercial airliners do not offer UVA protection, they do block most of the UVB, however.
I'm assuming the italizing your remark means you're being sarcastic. Melanona rates among airline pilots are 42% higher than the general population (per NIH). Flying at cosmic radiating altitudes, and in a 3/4 untinted glass case for 30 years is not a free lunch, no matter how well people think they're getting paid for the trouble of getting cancer. Add the WOCL cohort within that macro-demographic, and yeah it's about a foregone conclusion from where I sit. The level of occupational cancer denialism in this occupation is astounding. Thankfully, we are making strides (at least on mil side) in getting our overlord to recognize the injurious nature of our work, and be funded treatment without hemming and hawing, to say nothing of mocking the notion that it is a significantly higher cancer inducing affair. In fairness to the airlines, the one coworker we had who lost his wings (and consequently his Class I) due to eyeball cancer, managed to get it caught in time, and last I heard, UAL LTD policy has been able to keep hin afloat in forced retirement. Not all airlines are up to par when it comes to taking care of their occupationally discarded, to be euphemistic. Wasn't even close to 60 when it happened either. So yeah, I know of at least one 'blind and well tanned' pilot who is lucky to be alive. Heck that blancolirio guy got prostate cancer, another airline pilot common special. I know two in my last unit alone, plus my extended "family" (not blood family) member who dabbled in jet part 91 for 40 years (high altitude small/med cabin class). All three survived it but continue monitoring for life. My father has an active history of cancerous skin lesions on his scalp, and I have the same skin complexion and widow's peak lack of hair coverage there. You're not gonna catch me playing the plausible deniability game on that. I can pretty much guarantee that's coming to me if I don't take proactive steps in my middle age to ameliorate that risk factor. That means no beach going for me without UV protecting my head, neck and ears, and long sleeved shirts. Ditto for when I get the RV, I'll def invest in tinting and curtain installation over the bubble canopy.
Interesting. I thought it would have been an overall cancer risk as in greater radiation dose to the whole body.
Where's @wanttaja when we need some statistics? Which aviation incident is more likely to kill me: skin cancer, engine failure, or flying into a NORDO seaplane?
Both statements are true concurrently. The mechanisms for the skin vs other cancers are different. It's not a mutually exclusive affair. The takeaway is that for both types of cancer (skin vs other), the exposure to the risk mechanisms of consequence for said type, is in fact higher for airline pilots than pedestrian car drivers.
I’ll stick with helos. Can’t go high enough to get into the hazards of radiation. Then again, can’t get high enough to get out the hazards of breathing smog. Screwed either way I guess.
Though it's a cumulative effect when it comes to cosmic radiation, at 10,000 feet and below it provides an occupational atmospheric insulation similar to working a pedestrian job. Diurnal schedules are also more benign on that front. For the purposes of cosmic radiation, flying helos, or even my own job as a trainer pilot (with vertical and duration profiles equivalent to that of a skydiving King Air pilot) are pedestrian jobs. Mainly due to lack of fire control radar. To wit, the people flying the highest paying equipment (high, night, long, at the same time), are also the ones at the largest overall exposure to occupational cancers. Some people might think well that's ok, "a pound for your flesh" Faustian bargain type of thing. Which is why, adjusted for incomes, the overall worst off are military aviators in fire control radar equipped aircraft, who are not paid particularly well for civilian equivalent standards (in present circumstances) and have even greater exposure due to radar and less stringent environmental exposure standards when downrange. Brings a whole new meaning to indentured servitude. At any rate, the military continues to deny the correlation to cancer under the misunderstood generality that non-ionizing radiation is not carcinogenic, but I've yet found a set of parents willing to raise their children in a homestead where a high power radar emitter is parked on the adjacent lot. Do as I say not as I do type of thing coming from uncle sammy. There's some ongoing research on how RF radiation attenuates and distorts our brain's magnetic field, latter which underlies our ability to make cognitive processing tasks, and how a chronic persistence of high powered RF emission through our nugget can in fact alter our ability to cell repair in older age, which is ultimately the underlying theory of how non-ionizing radiation can in fact be carcinogenic. People usually retort about cell phones, but that's a joke, as it's understood it is the high powered nature of the emission here that is of consequence. Even a cell phone stuck to your ear doesn't create the level of concentrated emission that a pilot in a cockpit with an AESA radar between your legs or behind and top of your nugget is exposed to. In the case of fighters, the gold lining coating of bubble canopies in order to attenuate adversary radar return, acts as a greenhouse of RF from one's own radar, that effectively radiates you in a concentrated fashion (due to the lens geometry of the canopy) for hours upon hours upon years upon decade, depending on the pilot's career progression. The healthiest airline flying from an occupational standard, is the non-redeye regional flying. DL 717 would be the best paying one, and the one I'd pick if I had to. And of course, the lower your block time over a career, the better.
The FAA did a study with actual windshields, from various turbine-powered aircraft as well as a C182 and a Bonanza. "Optical Radiation Transmittance of Aircraft Windscreens and Pilot Vision" https://www.faa.gov/data_research/research/med_humanfacs/oamtechreports/2000s/media/200720.pdf Bottom line: Polycarbonate windscreens (used in the C182 and Bonanza) are the best at blocking UVB, which is the dangerous part of the spectrum. Multilayer laminated glass (used in all the turbine powered aircraft windscreens) is almost as good as polycarbonate. Elsewhere, for automotive applications, I found that unlaminated glass (side windows of cars) isn't as good as laminated glass (windshields).
I suspect the sarcasm was the math... "for every 1,000 feet increase in altitude, the sun's intensity increases almost 10 percent" So there's 200% more sun at 20,000 feet? Doesn't seem that much brighter... Paul
Since most of my flying has been below 10,000 feet and shaded by high wing I can't attribute melanoma on my neck to that, but I do attribute it to driving, never really thinking to put sunscreen on my neck when I was in a car. Radical resection was ten years ago, but it can be a deadly form of cancer. Many states prohibit use of UV tinting of front windows, but I don't think that's in the best interest of public health.
^^^ yikes! Glad you're okay - gonna go slather some sunscreen on me now. As I get older I've found that dry skin has become more and more of a problem, and my wife found a moisturizer that provides sun protection. I've been using that liberally every morning these days. Of course the cosmic radiation is an issue in my line of work, but there aren't a lot of mitigating strategies there - some guys intentionally fly lower, but I suspect a couple thousand feet here and there is more a phycological solution than anything.
Cosmic radiation is a big deal, for airline crews. For mitigating strategies, can you refuse flights that come near the magnetic North Pole? Those are the worst, where you lose two ways: you lose protection from the atmosphere by flying high, and you also lose protection from Earth's magnetic field. Low-altitude flights near the equator should be the best for cosmic rays, high-altitude flights near the magnetic pole the worst.
We can definitely bid and trade trips to focus flying to specific regions - for example it's easy for me to only fly to South America - but that limits some of the advantages of doing the widebody flying to begin with. Most pilots that are genuinely concerned about the radiation would just bid back to narrowbody, go work in the schoolhouse, or simply do something else entirely. The other choice is to limit block hours, which if you live in base can be done pretty easily by bidding short call. A lot of guys end up with fewer than 100 hours for the year this way, and probably get the majority of their cosmic radiation while in the back of a 737 or Airbus to do their three bounces in the simulator.
