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2 Answers

Airliner weight and balance

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General Aviation

Do any atp guys know what would happen if all the passengers on an airliner moved to the back of the plane in flight? Would it take the cg past limits? I would look but I don't have a spare 737 poh handy.

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2 Answers



  1. gregarious119 on Feb 28, 2016

    Depends on the aircraft, load factor, fuel load, cargo load, and a number of other things. I would say as a general rule it would be discouraged, and in many cases – yes – it probably would bring an aircraft out of CG. But to say so automatically in any case would be misleading.

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  2. Bob Manning on Feb 29, 2016

    Let me point you to two FAA manuals; Aircraft Weight and Balance Handbook, available here https://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies/handbooks_manuals/aircraft/media/FAA-H-8083-1A.pdf and Weight-Shift Control (WSC) Aircraft Flying Handbook available here https://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies/handbooks_manuals/aviation/media/FAA-H-8083-5.pdf.

    Typically, transports are loaded in zones. As long as the pax don’t move outside the zones, C.G limits are not exceeded. If you look in the W&B HB; p 7-3 you’ll see the forward compartment has a arm of 582 for 1-29 pax and the rear compartment an arm of 1028 for pax 1-133. So that coach area has 26 rows for a centroid of 1028. In the manual, they didn’t even give a method for changing loading for the coach seats.

    Hope this has helped.

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