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Airplanes; The Invention of and How They Fly Essay

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A pilot does not have to be an aeronautical engineer to learn to fly an airplane. However, it is a good idea to have good knowledge of aerodynamics and flight theory to be able to fly safely. There are four basic components in making an airplane fly, lift, drag, thrust, and weight. All of these work in unison to make a plane stay in the air. If one of the first three is taken out of the equation, gravity and weight will take over and cause the plane to descend. It is up to the pilot to understand how to make them equal in order to keep the airplane in flight or descend at an acceptable rate, in order to safely land the airplane. Before staring work to get a pilot’s license it would be a good idea to understand several aspects before the …show more content…

Lift is one of the most contested components of airplane flight. There are different theories in how an airplane reacts to air being rushed over its wings. In all actuality the entire airplane promotes lift. Often it is forgotten how the top portion of the airplane and wing plays just as an important role in creating lift as the bottom of the airplane and wing. As stated in How Airplanes Fly “Lift is the force that directly opposes the weight of an airplane and holds the airplane in the air” (Eberhardt). Lift must overcome or be equal to the weight of the airplane (Eichenberger). Lift is produced as the air flows over the body and wings of the airplane as it is moving forward. The wings help to develop most of the lift due to their design. They come in different shapes and sizes, from short wings to very long wings, even a propeller of a helicopter is considered a wing. No matter what size or shape, wings are designed to create lift. According to Newton’s third law, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. This means the lift of a wing is equal to the change in momentum of the air it is diverting downward (Eberhardt). Pilots have controls to increase the size of the wing while the airplane is flying, thus increasing lift and helping to keep the airplane flying at slower speeds. With the body and wings creating lift, their sheer size creates another variable a pilot must

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