Why do planes seem to stop mid air and not fall?

Answer 1

it's a optical illusion. I believe the term is paralax. a.) It's hard to judge speed with out a frame of reference. a plane in teh sky there isn't anythign really next to it that you can use to judge it's relitive speed. Also due to the distance that the plan is from the viewer the aparant angular distance is very small thus your eyes movement which is how you track speed is very small

Answer 2

In order for a plane to "stop mid air and not fall" there would have to be an equilibrium between the headwind and the thrust. If the plane is travelling at 60 knots and the wind it is travelling into is also 60 knots, then the plane would be able to sit over one spot and not fall. However, it's more likely that many of the planes that appear to "stop" are actually flying slowly into a strong headwind thereby slowing their speed by the factor of the wind. If at anytime the plane loses lift, it will fall (or at least fall until it, hopefully, re-establishes the lift).

Answer 3

Any plane can stop mid air and not fall and even fly backwards under certain conditions.
Example: A airplane has a stall speed 50 MPH. That means it needs 50 MPH of wind speed passing over the wings and tail to fly. If you have 40 MPH of wind on the nose of the airplane, the airplane only needs 10 MPH of ground speed to fly. Now if the wind speed was to increase to 60 MPH you would be able to stand still or reduce power and fly backwards.

If you look at aircraft carriers you'll see them turn into the wind and put as much wind across the deck as they can to create as much wind across the airfoils as possible so the jets can takeoff with minimum forward speed but enough air speed to fly.

In flying you have 2 speeds. Air speed and ground speed. You can have 200 MPH air speed indicated and only 140 MPH ground speed if you have a 60 MPH head wind.
You can also have 140 MPH air speed indicated and 200 MPH ground speed if you have a 60 MPH tail wind.

Answer 4

I always asked my mom that same question thinking that planes flew at five miles an hour. But no, they do not stop in mid air. If they did, you would scream, panic, the plane would fall straight down and explode with the force of a nuclear bomb.

Answer 5

They do not stop in mid air this is an optical illusion.
If they were to stop you would be on the way to falling out of the sky.

Answer 6

I believe what you are describing is known as a somatogravic illusion. What you are feeling is the aircraft leveling off from a climb. The "feels" like a rotation forward like doing a flip and can give you the illusion of stopping, or even of falling backwards. It is due to the fluid in your inner ears moving in a direction opposite of the rest of your head. Your body feels this ind interperets it as movement other thatn what is correct, creating a powerful illusion

Answer 7

The fluid in your ear acts upon tiny hairs (Otoliths) in your cochlea, in the ear, these detect linear motion. If the plane is moving at a constant speed, you'll detect the initial movement but the hairs will slowly "reset" themselves to their original position so your brain is fooled in to thinking you're not moving.

Answer 8

Planes can not fly without air moving over the wings, so you must be experiencing something else.

Answer 9

due to the curvature of the earth and the altitude at which planes fly,although they are travling a short distance they are travling a long distance

Answer 10

if you mean stalling, old WWII B-52 jets are able