Cecil? Did the plane shut its engines off during the meal? If so - Then of course you’re correct - Otherwise, by the time the Meal is over, the plane would of lost a significant amount of weight - Namely, the amount of jet fuel that the plane uses as the passengers finish their meal.
(just picking nits)
Cecil already picked that nit, in the column you linked:
*We’ll also ignore–I hate to have to throw all these qualifications in here, but I’m surrounded by nitpickers–weight loss due to jet fuel consumption during the meal. *
While we’re at it, let’s also ignore mass-energy lost by thermal radiation to the (colder) surrounding air.
This seems as good a place as any to ask when the toilet tanks are purged.
People eat their meals, run to the toilet… (I guess they could just use the airsick bag, but who wouldn’t prefer to barf in private?) When the system gets full, it has to be purged, right? I doubt there’s any doubt that dumping a bunch of blue ice would lighten a plane.
Granted, this is from 2003, but if you visit the link in my previous post, you’ll see that part of the issue is that some planes are fitted with different equipment.
BTW, I really tried to post earlier, but couldn’t get on the boards.
But that different equipment merely reduces leaks in newer planes, leaks that allowed ice to form outside the plane. Nowhere did it say that older planes were able to intentionally dump the holding tanks in flight.