HI there, What are Contrails? I’m embarrassed to ask. Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance. I am a noobie when it comes to Aviation…And Flight Simming. I have seen it mentioned in different threads.
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condensation from the engines at higher altitudes.
a.k.a. the white stripes you see behind high flying aircraft from your backyard on a clear blue skies day.
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Engines burn fuel which contains hydrogen and carbon. The hydrogen becomes water which leaves in the exhaust. At high altitudes, the air is so cold that the water condenses before the dilution effect causes the water to stay vapor. So you see the microdroplets/ ice particles behind the engines. After time to dilute with more dry air, they evaporate.
The exact temperature and humidity determine how long they last and how far behind the plane they appear.
Contrail is short for condensation trail.
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No need to feel stupid, everyone has to start somewhere and asking questions is the best way to do that for sure. I for one, am personally glad you didn’t ask what chemtrails were. Lol. Cheers looks like everyone got you well covered here.
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Haha.
No need for me to reiterate the above answers.
But I will say that your embarrassment is unnecessary.
An honest question deserves an honest answer.
Regards.
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“No need for me to reiterate the above answers. But I will say that your embarrassment is unnecessary.”
Sure. But just googling “contrail” seems smarter to me.
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I knew someone was going to mention googling…What’s the sense of having a forum?
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Sure PeterE1959. You can ask all the stupid questions you want, no problem 
Definitely not a dumb question at all.
You should only be embarrassed if you call them “chemtrails” and think they’re some kind of chemical being sprayed from jet engines to control people’s minds.
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They are really chemtrails that governments or other parties are engaged in to add toxic chemicals to the atmosphere from aircraft in a way that forms visible plumes in the sky, somewhat similar to contrails. Various different motivations for this alleged spraying are speculated, including sterilization, reduction of life expectancy, mind control or weather control.
That’s what they really are! Just ask me I’ll tell ya! 
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What’s the point in Google then?
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I would rather ask in here, then use Google and always being told that I need to google it first.
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Is google not available? This is like people wanting to be just a part of the conversation. So come in and ask any old question. Why bother looking up the answer yourself?
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Not sure if I understand your logic? Googling would create an instant answer as opposed to posting in a forum. If the Google results are not satisfactory then posting in a forum would be the next step. But I guess if you have a lot of time to waste then forum posting would suffice. Anyway whatever works for you. To each their own.
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So we all have to conform to your way of doing things eh?
NOT!
Addendum:
I have self edited this post because I am a spineless contributor!
Let’s keep it civil guys and galls.
It doesn’t matter how you get an answer to a “stupid” question, I just personally find it odd that people in general don’t use Google to get an instantaneous answer instead of posting to a forum then having to wait for it…I mean search engines are there to be used, use them!
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I like questions like this. Give me these threads all day over “my edge case should be Asobo’s #1 priority” or “this flight simulator scenery isn’t perfect in a still photo from 50 ft AGL.”
I have another question. For which planes can you see contrails in FS at the moment? In reality I think that should be all planes that can fly high enough to make the exhaust gases condensate, but I have some doubts that it is already implementet for the props and turboprops, like the Daher and the WW2 planes or am I wrong?
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