[imagesource:publicdomianimages]

Passenger aeroplanes might appear really slow when you spy them from the ground, but due to their height, we never really get to appreciate how fast these metal birds are.

But now, a TikTok video shows just how quickly a passenger jet actually moves when we’re not looking at it from a great distance.

This ‘slowing’ phenomenon is called the Motion Parallax and has to do with how fast an object moves through our field of vision. The further away it is, the slower it appears. A car driving right past us at 60km/h might appear faster than a jet doing 800km/h up in the sky.

But what if you were floating right next to the aeroplane?

The TikTok video shows a Boeing 737 which has an eye-watering cruising speed of 880km/h, and rather than the usual squinting at an aircraft from a great distance, the video shows an airliner flying past in the clouds, looking like it’s just cruising to its destination. Have a look:

Aeroplanes are by far one of the greatest inventions humanity has ever come up with. When you take away all the sciency stuff, you have to admit that it’s still basically just magic.

[source:ladbible]