KIAS / GS
I'm a little confused. Please understand that I am normally a short hop pilot.
I took off from Rochester, NY in my 737-700 and flew for 6 hours at FL25,000 ft. 310KIAS, heading 270 for six hours. I went to bed at midnight, shortly after takeoff, and got up at 6 this morning. I was expecting to be over Oregan covering about 2139 miles. I found that I was out over the Pacific and had covered just over 3000 miles. That's a ground speed of around 500mph. Sadly all 133 passangers + crew were lost as I did not have enough fuel to get back to any land. 
So, my question is; What time did the train get to Chicago? No, no that's not it. What did I do wrong when I calculated how far I would travel?
I know that a nautical mile is 1.15 statute miles, I was flying against the prevailing wind, so it's not like the jet stream carried me. I'm just confused.
4 Answers
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Not sure how to help you. One thing that I would recommend is that you set up a flight plan for longer flights. Generally I just use the Direct/GPS selection. This way you'll have a rough ESTIMATE (With FsP, this is especially important, always leave plenty of extra time over the estimate, as it is usually wrong anyway) of how long it's going to take. That way you will be able to set your alarm in time to get up and hopefully be there when you planned.
Well, indicated airspeed is just that. Indicated. It depends on altitude, pressure etc. It is not the speed with which you travel over the ground, the "real" speed if you will.
At 25000 feet 310 knots would be close to 500 mph, if not more, so I'm not surprised you overshot. Don't use indicated airspeed for distance calculation, only for "functions". Take off speed, stall speed, icing conditions, flap deployment etc.
I am also a little confused. Why did you take off just before bedtime,
and let the plane fly on autopilot for six hours?? If you do not care to
see the land between Rochester and the Pacific you can speed up the
simulation. You can also save the flight at any point, and resume at
the point where you quit. That way you would not have to take off
from Rochester again. 🙄
I know that a nautical mile is 1.15 statute miles,
I think that the problem is that a nautical mile is NOT 1.15 statute miles, it is:
1.15077945 SM=1 NM
Good Luck.
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