Brown stuff falling out of the sky?!

[leonbrumsack]

As I was just sitting outside enjoying the sun (at my home, not far from Northolt and Heathrow), a little droplet of light brown liquid no more than 2mm in diameter fell out of the sky and landed on my hand. It didn't look as though it was from a bird, but is something that happens fairly frequently, for example the marks can be seen on cars from time to time. Someone (with no aviation knowledge!) suggested that these droplets are waste released from aircraft - something I find hard to believe. I know it sounds like a ridiculous question, but does anybody have any idea what it is?! And does it have anything to do with the aircraft which fly over all the time?!

Thanks,

Leon (Confused!):confused:

[BA777]

Well,

From what i've seen, all the waste is removed on the ground. Maybe it was dirt or something?

Henry

[gas path]

Leon
It must have been a (small) bird. The trajectory of suspect sh1t would have been such that said feathered friend probably would have been long gone by the time you looked up.
Now if it had been a 747 on it's way home after a 13 hour sector that had dumped 320 gallons of the stuff............methinks you'd have known about it:E :E

[leonbrumsack]

That's roughly what I thought, bird cr:eek: p, but it really was a very tiny little speck of it. Still not totally convinced it was cr:eek: p, but I guess it makes sense. Does anybody else have any theories, or has anyone else had a similar experience (sh:eek:t on by a bird? :D)

[Notso Fantastic]

All lavatory waste goes into holding tanks. The only waste leaked overboard is galley & toilet sink waste. Maybe it was a teapot being emptied, BUT I'm fairly certain from several thousand feet such liquid waste would have long evaporated falling through air. Rain falls through almost 100% humid air which is why it doesn't evaporate, but through a <100% humid sky- no chance. It's dem boidies!

[BigGreenPleasureMachine]

May sound silly, but if it was quite a reddish brown, it may have been sahara sand. Have seen it myself, and an instance was reported in the west of Ireland yesterday. It gets blown up in sand storms, tends to travel with prevailing winds, then mixes with cloud over these islands and can be seen on your car as a dusty blotch(es) in the morning. Possible?

[lomapaseo]

Waste leaks from the lavs is blue in colour and typically freezes to a blivet of seveal pounds at altitude only to shear off when the aircraft skin warms up.

Your description would rule that out.

Bird poop in the air breaks up into white not brown droplets. To prove this just stand on a boat fan tail or poop deck of a ship and throw some fishing chum to the gulls. They will process it and give you back a favour.

I suspect that what you may be experiencing is the outfall of some smokestack upwind.

[aidanf]

I know of a guy who once had a bird s**t on his head - he swore that he'd never take her out again...:8

[Taildragger55]

Near a drop zone?

First skydives can be traumatic

[BN2A]

Isn't there a Nescafe factory in or near Hayes? That would chuck up brown stuff in the form of coffee... :ooh:

[ratsarrse]

A variation on 'sh!t always rolls downhill'

[Johnny F@rt Pants]

De-icing fluid???????? Yesterday?????????

I know I wasn't in the country but I could swear I saw the weather report and it was in the 20's.

I don't think so.

[Basil]

Could it be bee poo coloured sort of sienna by the pollen in it? (I understand they refuel on the stuff in addition to collecting it) - sometimes see it on the car :ooh:

[allthatglitters]

"Waste leaks from the lavs is blue in colour"
Many aircraft now have vacuum operated toilets and do not have the blue sanitizing and deodorising liquid, normally refered to as Racasan.

[Lump Jockey]

That will be bee plop mate! No doubt about it! As you say, it's light brown in colour, could it be mustardy even, in colour? If so, I definately suspect bee squirt!

[Golden Rivet]

Guess you never tried tasting it ?

GR

[Celtic Frog]

Almost certainly just a bit of light rain fall with some dust added to it. Lost count fthe number of times I've seen clumps of grass and bits of newspaper carried up a couple of thousand feet by summer thermal activity. And lost count of number of times I've flown in gusty conditions and come down with filthy aircraft covered in dust that was picked up into atmosphere. What you had was caused probably by the dust making just a few water droplets heavy enough to fall while otherwise it wasn't raining.
(Did you taste it?)

[lomapaseo]

What's the sense of tasting it unless you're prepared to run a control sample through your taste buds for taste comparison.

How else to tell what it taste like.

let's see "smokey barbecue that lasts on your tongue, with a hint of slightly salty etc. etc."..........my mind wanders

[PA38]

It's a new way of spreading mind bending drugs around, now that the plebs are on to distributing it by contrails:p :p :p :p

[Rwy in Sight]

Last Friday I flew on an Airbus A300-600 and a member of the cabin crew asked me not to use the lav on the ground. Being very curious I asked why. He said that the sink leaks on the outside and there are security issues (he further elaborated that they were concerened of hiding a bomb there).

No the question remains why sink and galley wastes leak on the outside and not stored on board to be emptied later:confused:

[fruitloop]

Rwy in sight,
Most A/c sinks and galleys are dumped overboard.It can be interesting if the drain heaters don't work.

[PlaneTruth]

In many aircraft, especially Boeings, the lav sink is drained into the lav tank. Both are dumped into waste trucks on the ground. Many galley sinks vent overboard. (You can see the coffee being dumped prior to takeoff.)

On the C-130 I flew, the piss drains vented overboard. I have had Tower call during a rest stop on the ramp during training, "You seem to have a leak near the tail..." He was right, four leaks in fact! Which can come in really handily --like when your over France.


PT
:p:O :(

[Inverted81]

The RAF don't have much luck either!!! A close friend is an aircraft engineer up at Waddington on the E3 sentry's. One of his first jobs when he was posted (i now guess it was initiation) was to empty the honey tanks. Unfortunately when he turned the valve on the connector broke free and henceforth washed my mate on his back about 10ft away from the aircraft...... now thats alot of brown liquid!!!
I think they may have been pulling my leg, but about three years ago i was flying in a Tristar KC over the north sea refuelling tornado GR1's , we were told by the air loadmaster that the toilets were "out of bounds " whilst the aircraft were being refuelled as the waste is offloaded and would hit the canopies of the aircraft. As far as i Know tornados don't have windscreen wipers! :)) :)) :))