Where do poop and pee go on airplanes?

Moment of Um

American Public Media

Kids & Family, Education For Kids

4.4 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 19 May 2025

⏱️ 5 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Dogs come in so many different sizes, from the tiniest teacup terrier to the giant Great Dane. How did we get such a delightful assortment of these furry best buddies? We asked Brains On producer and archaeologist Anna Goldfield to help us find the answer.

Got a question that’s been hounding you? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll make sure to bark up the right tree!

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	From the brains behind brains on, this is the moment of um.
0:06.0	Answering those questions that make you go,
0:08.0	um, um, um, um, um,
0:11.0	um, um, um, um, um, um, um. Moment of um comes to you from APM Studios. I'm Anna Goldfield.
0:28.9	Um.
0:30.8	Um. I've gotten the chance to fly to a lot of different places in my life so far.
0:39.2	It's always a bit stressful actually getting through airport security and onto the airplane,
0:44.2	but once I'm in my seat, I can put on my headphones and tune out.
0:48.3	I've also been on a few really long flights.
0:52.3	The longest one I ever took was to South Africa, and that was something
0:56.0	like 20 hours of air travel. When you're in a plane for that long, you got to have a strategy.
1:03.8	Take lots of breaks to get up and stretch. Have some fun activities to do. I always bring a book
1:09.3	and a couple of crossword puzzles.
1:13.0	And it's important to stay hydrated.
1:17.9	On a long flight, at some point you're going to need to use the airplane toilet.
1:20.7	Honestly, it's a little bit exciting.
1:26.6	You go into the teeny tiny bathroom, do what you need to do, press the flush button, and the toilet makes a loud noise and whisks everything away at lightning speed.
1:33.3	I've always wondered where all that stuff goes, though.
1:36.4	It doesn't just fly out of the back of the plane, right?
1:39.2	So where is it?
1:40.8	My buddy Hugh had a question about this, too.
1:43.4	Where does the waste go on airplanes?
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from American Public Media, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of American Public Media and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.