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A comment on Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane.

Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by jobu on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:14PM (#14620238)
"According to a 2004 EPA sample of 158 planes, 13 percent contained coliform. Two of the airplanes were found to have dangerous E.coli in the water."

That is kinda gross, but realistically all that bacteria would be killed by heating the water.

More of a concern is that is the same tap water in the bathroom for washing hands. Last flight I took I noticed there was a Purell dispenser in the bathroom next to the sink and I wondered why that was necessary given there was soap and water.

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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by dragon_greens on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:21PM (#14620306)
Simply heating does not kill all bacteria magically. That would require boiling for some time and I doubt that happens in-flight.
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by sfeng on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:28PM (#14620384)
Heat absolutely does kill bacteria. Heating water for just a few minutes at 60C will kill e. coli, 70C will kill it instantly. Coffee is brewed at 90-100C.

[1] https://academic.oup.com/jtm/article-pdf/3/1/11/5107757/jtm3...

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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by leephillips on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:46PM (#14620562)
Yeah, but not "magically".
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by rjsw on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:44PM (#14620538)
Airplanes are not pressurized to sea level though, water boils at lower temperatures at altitude.
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by spiznnx on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:47PM (#14620567)
On airplanes, pressure is equivalent to about 2000m ASL, at which water boils at 93.4 °C
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by rjsw on Friday June 23, 2017 @02:27PM (#14621465)
There are several ski resorts at 2000m, you notice the difference in coffee temperature from sea level.
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by elif on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:28PM (#14620383)
yea wilderness survival says full boil for at least 3 minutes, more in higher altitude. While shopping for an on-demand hot water tap, I couldn't find a single one that even went up to boiling temperature, so my hunch is that airplanes don't even boil for a second.
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by benjohnson on Friday June 23, 2017 @03:55PM (#14622247)
The 3 minutes idea is to kill anything that may be deeply imbedded the bits of wood, leaves, and other detritus suspended in the water.

It's generally considered paranoid overkill when you consider the water will take a while to cool - it will stay in the "kill everything" temperature for quite a while in the process.

https://besurvival.com/guides/how-long-should-you-boil-water

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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by refurb on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:34PM (#14620441)
It depends on what you're trying to kill. Some bacteria perish quickly at less-than-boiling temperatures. In the wild, you have spores and other hardy organisms that require a lot more heat and time to kill.
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by joerickard on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:25PM (#14620352)
Also, 'boiling' at the cabin pressure is not quite normal boiling.
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by jcranmer on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:37PM (#14620474)
The safe temperature for killing bacteria is about 140°F or 60°C. To get water to boil at that low a temperature requires about ⅕ atmospheric pressure, or roughly the atmospheric pressure outside the aircraft.
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by Navarr on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:20PM (#14620293)
Some people prefer sanitizer as opposed to soap and water? shrug
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by ada1981 on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:26PM (#14620355)
Some people prefer free sanitizer to booze.
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by johndevor on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:24PM (#14620344)
Doesn't our stomach kill a lot of bacteria with the acid?
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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by refurb on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:39PM (#14620496)
Surprisingly not. How else would your intestinal biome be established unless bacteria passed unharmed through your stomach?

Also, there are lots of diseases such as E. coli infection, etc, that are food borne. Stomach acid doesn't seem to help all that much with those.

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Re:Think Twice Before Ordering Coffee or Tea on a Plane by majewsky on Friday June 23, 2017 @12:26PM (#14620358)
Food and drinks pass through other parts of our body before hitting the stomach.
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