Detroit Airport Fountain

There is a very interesting water fountain in concourse A of Detroit Airport. Its hard to describe it, but I will continue to do it anyways. There is a huge circular flat-top granite structure, with tiny holes at different locations through which shoot jets of water. These water jets float in the air before they find their landing spot. Their are random patterns generated, but the water jets fly like birds with different trajectories without hitting each other .The entire surface is extremely flat and yet not a drop of water spills out to the area surrounding the fountain. Capillary action takes the water stream around the contour of the structure and channel them back. Here is a link to a youtube video of the same




As I sit there sipping my latte and typing this post, I see numerous amazed passengers stop by and take pictures. I hear a small kid say, 'This is science. Science is cool'. But its not just kids, there are grown ups who stop to admire this fountain as well. I see an old guy going in circles taking a video of the fountain. I see a teenager who tries to mess with the fountain by blocking one of the holes and stifling the jet, only to find that the lower half of his jeans is now completely wet. I mutter to myself 'Serves you right...you brat!'

This is not the first time I am seeing this fountain. I vividly remember that eventful day in August 2003 when I first landed in US. As if my arrival wasn't eventful enough, the entire North East suffered a power-grid failure the same evening causing a blackout that canceled all flights from Detroit. On that day, anxiety got the better of me, and I never spent enough time to admire this fountain. After being stranded for 6 hours at DTW, our flight finally took off to State College. As I sit here at Detroit Airport on this Thursday morning, it brings back a lot of memories from that young nervous evening. Since then, whenever I fly through Detroit, I pay homage to this fountain.

So if you ever happen to fly through Detroit Airport, take a hike to concourse A and see this fountain. While at that, walk through the funky musical tunnel connecting Concourse A to Concourse B & C. Off all the domestic airports I have been to in US, I would definitely rank Detroit Wayne Airport as the best!