Fun With Units….
Way back in the last century, when I was in Aero Engineering school, we had a visiting professor (from GD in Forth Worth, home of the F-16….) for our senior design project. He announced that the use of ANY speed units (mph, fps, etc…) other than knots would be cause for an immediate “F” on anything submitted for grading because “that’s how the industry works, and you’d better get used to it!” (Of course, all your computations were in fps, so you had to convert in the end….)
Didn’t bother me - I was already a pilot before I got to college, and was used to knots because that’s what the “system” used - even though I learned to fly in the days where most GA airplanes were still calibrated in mph.
Of course, I went on to run missions with a flying machine that used knots, feet-per-second, and Mach - depending on the phase of flight. And once we started flying with our friends overseas, we added meters-per-second to the mix. All in a days work.
I chuckle every September when I get together with my “fast friends” at the Reno Races and they all do everything in mph (even the airline and military pilots who use knots in their day jobs) because…yup, the numbers are bigger that way!
My own airplanes? Everything is in knots because that’s what my profession uses (for atmospheric flight), and what ATC expects.
Paul