PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - Flying faster because of decreasing winds
Old 17th Nov 2008, 10:36
  #29 (permalink)  
Wizofoz
 
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: Boldly going where no split infinitive has gone before..
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Chris,

The amount which an aircraft needs to accelerate due to a change in the wind in order to regain it's original airspeed is equal to the change in the wind. All frames of reference relevant to the flight of the aircraft are to do with the air it's flying through. As a consequence, yes it's velocity relative to the ground will change, and as such all consequential values which have velocity as a factor will change relative to the surface, but that is consequential, not causational.

Lets suppose that while the aircraft is in flight, someone attaches a mega rocket to the earth and suddenly changes it's rotational speed. Let's, for argument, assume friction doesn't cause the atmosphere to change IT's velocity, so the aircraft is still flying in the same surrounding air. The aircraft now has a ground speed that might be greater, less or sideways!! Relative to an observer on the ground, it's ground speed, momentum and Kv will all have changed. Will it effect the way the aircraft flys? Not at all! The aircraft won't know, until such time as it tries to land on the earths surface.

Perhaps the concept you are not quite seeing is the amount of kinetic energy an object has is relative to the observer.
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