The flight between London and Frankfurt isn鈥檛 all that visually interesting, but聽, I couldn鈥檛 stop looking out the window.
The app uses your phone鈥檚 GPS chip, even in airplane mode, to track your location and provide fun geographical, geological, and historical facts about what鈥檚 below. For example, during the flight, I learned about the HMHS Lanfranc, a hospital ship torpedoed by the Germans during World War I that鈥檚 still at the bottom of the English Channel. I also learned that the Rhine聽River鈥檚 headwaters are in southern Switzerland, and I read about the famous Koppenberg hill climb in Ardennes, Belgium, known for crushing cyclists in the Tour of Flanders because it鈥檚 as steep as 22 percent and covered in greasy cobblestones.
The app doesn鈥檛 store聽all of this information at all times. Instead, it prompts you to enter a start and end point before getting on the plane.聽The app then scours its database and聽downloads relevant information. Geologic information comes from , fossil data comes from and ,聽and everything else comes from聽Wikipedia. Tap an icon to reveal information as you pass over a predownloaded聽area.
Flyover Country is the creation of Amy Myrbo and Shane Loeffler, geologists at the University of Minnesota who applied for a National Science Foundation grant to help make geological information more accessible聽and more聽fun. Loeffler says the idea occurred to him on a flight, naturally.
The app is mostly accurate聽but not perfect. Most of what it shows you should be relatively close to your flight path,聽but it does stray a little far at times if, for example, the pilot has to take a new route to avoid bad weather.聽Down the road, Myrbo and Loeffler聽want to augment the app, eventually including聽a feature that,聽using the GPS chip, could identify landmarks and call up information once it locks聽on.聽鈥淚t鈥檚 not a terribly hard problem as long as the compass sensors in phones aren鈥檛 too confused by the plane鈥檚 fuselage,鈥 Loeffler says.
Loeffler also wants to add more data sources, like information about climbing routes. Theoretically, you would fly out of Jackson Hole and聽point your phone at the window, and the app would show you an overlay of routes up the Grand Teton. 鈥淲e鈥檙e geologists, so we鈥檙e always going to be mainly focused on the landscape formations, but adding the ground cover鈥s absolutely relevant,鈥 he says. The app might also eventually point you to podcasts (from other sources) that talk about what you鈥檙e seeing.
And here鈥檚 the best part: You don鈥檛 have to use the app in a plane. You can download a driving or hiking route, and the app聽will still pull nearby information. You won鈥檛 be able to see all the points of interest like you would from a plane, but your route will still be significantly more interesting.