City in the Sky: Season 1 (2016)

As I would expect from PBS, City in the Sky is a very well-produced, up-to-date, and informative documentary about air flight and the worldwide infrastructure that supports it. This show is full of facts and statistics about the people, baggage, produce, and fuel that jet planes transport every day or year (to put things in perspective), but it is impressive to witness in action the massive facilities all over the world (from Atlanta to Dubai to Hong Kong to the UK) that test and build and service (and store or demolish retired) airplanes, store and route baggage, deliver food and weather and medical services, perform air traffic control, and monitor jet engine performance in real-time. The focus is on Boeing and Airbus jets with (I think it is) polycarbonate construction, which is 10 times stronger than aluminum and offers 20% greater fuel efficiency. (To the amateur reviewer who noted how one flight expends as much fuel as one year of driving the family car, divide that fuel by the 365 passengers in that flight and it is no more expensive than driving your car for one day.) City in the Sky introduces this 3-episode series with the metaphor of its title, because all the people in air transit at any given time could populate a large city. It is a stretched metaphor, and they push it consistently, but I do not begrudge them the effort, because they do a good job of framing the airline industry between global and personal contexts. The series introduces us to the actual personnel in charge of various operations all over the world, and while the tone is overwhelmingly "pro" industry, they candidly describe the risks and negatives as well as the preventive engineering. Watch the pilot (one of 26 so qualified) who navigates his jet manually through the tortuous terrain near Mount Everest to land on a runway 25% shorter than the standard minimum length. You will learn something new with this show, and may appreciate the boon of air travel even more. Enjoy! 4 stars. (10-11-2017)