Cool effects at Gravelly Point

Tonight, Jenny and I bicycled down to Crystal City for dinner, and then biked back up the Mt. Vernon Trail after dark. We stopped at Gravelly Point, which is immediately adjacent to the airport (less than fifty yards from the end of the runway), and decided to watch the planes landing. We discovered a very cool effect that only works at night. If you lie down centered exactly on the flight path, and then look straight up, when a plane flies over, it looks like it is going to crash right into you. This is probably because the plane is dropping altitude extremely fast on the final approach, and by only looking up, you can't judge relative distance.

Another interesting effect that we noticed is that each time after a plane touched down on the runway, a wind shock wave traveled back towards us, making a sound almost like a whip. At first I thought it might be due to the thrust reversers, but I noticed it occurred before they engaged. My guess is that this is probably the turbulent flow at the end of the wing flaps propagating backwards.