in a recent flight in a 737-300 from ENBO to ENRY i looked at the ground and behind the shadow of the plane (yes the plane i was sitting in) i saw a quite big black trail behind the plane. first i thought it might be a rocket or something, but then i realized that it must be the Contrail behind the engines.

I don’t think you’d see contrails – too high up, too small, too translucent.

You do get cloud shadows -we handle them separately and dedicate an extra shadow layer to that.

Would you see much of the shadow in the real world though? The sun isn’t a point source. Add to that the usual altitude of contrails, and the shadow will have dispersed quite a bit when it hits the ground.

Then again, I’m not a real pilot. Maybe you can see a faint outline moving over the ground underneath you. But at least it will be faint.

No. Shadows are only cast by opaque, not translucent things.

I second that!