Mountains on Flight Route From San Diego to Seattle?
Hi, A while ago I took a flight into San Francisco and we had to go over Mt. Shasta, and I really got uncomfortable. I'm looking to fly from San Diego to Seattle at some point in the future- does that include flying over any big mountains? Thanks!
Air Travel - 4 Answers
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1 :
Yes. You can use a thing called a map to see exactly which ones.
2 :
there are a lot of mountains and mountain ranges between that area. No big deal. The pilot will do everything possible to avoid hitting a mountain......that I can guarantee. It is done everyday all over the world. No need to worry.
3 :
The tallest mountain in the lower 48 states is Mt. Whitney, at about 14,500 feet, near the CA, NV border. Airplanes routinely cruise between 25,000 and 35,000 feet high. That puts a minimum of almost 2 miles between you and the top of the tallest mountain. Airplanes fly over mountain ranges thousands of times every day. Think about all of the flights from the west coast to anywhere from Denver on east. They all have to go over the Rocky Mountains. Happens all the time and nothing bad occurs. Personally, I think it is very interesting to fly over mountains. The perspective is unique and the features that you see are totally different than a map.
4 :
The most common route from San Diego flies over the water to Santa Catalina, then turns towards Los Angeles and continues north over low hills and mountains in SoCal. From there, it flies mostly over flat land until it gets about as far north as Lake Tahoe, where it flies over some low mountains again (9000 feet or so). It continues over that kind of terrain up past Crater Lake and stays over medium-sized mountains until it enters the Seattle area. All of these mountains are medium-sized, the highest along the route being around 9000 feet, which isn't very big. Since the airplane is typically flying at 34,000-38,000 feet on this route (a mile higher than Mount Everest), the mountains are far below. The route takes the airplane about 15 miles east of Mount Shasta, but it doesn't fly over the mountain (Mount Shasta is 14,000 feet high, so it's a big mountain, although still miles below the airplane). So you'd get a good view of Mount Shasta from a distance, but you wouldn't actually be flying close to it.
