It is generally agreed that the first true airplane was invented by the Wright Brothers in 1903. People had been flying for over a century before then, but they did so in hot air balloons.
Invented in France in the late 18th century, the hot air balloon was used for all manner of purposes, from traveling and entertainment to battlefield topography. Napoleon liked to use them for scouting.
However, balloons are slow and can’t stay aloft long, while planes could fly at 100 miles per hour and stay in the air for eight hours within a few decades of their invention.
Planes were in their infancy and already people were enthralled. To this day, learning how to fly a plane is something many people aspire to. We’ll teach you what we can in this article.
1. Understanding the Plane
Before you step into the pilot seat of a plane for the first time, it’s best to study planes and how they function. How do they fly, for instance?
When a plane is in the sky, the plane’s engines are pushing air downward beneath its wings. As the air goes underneath the wings it generates a force called lift, which pushes the plane up.
There is also a force of air going above the wings and pushing down, but the wings are designed at a curve or angle so that the air above the wings has more surface to cover. This makes it less dense, which lowers air pressure above the wings so the air pressure beneath the wings is stronger, generating more lift.
This is just one of many things you’ll need to study before you can get off the ground.
2. Learning the Controls
Learning how to fly a plane is as easy as learning the controls. However, don’t expect to take to a plane as quickly as you take to a car. Flying a plane can be much harder.
The basic reason for this is that a plane has a far larger range of motion that a car. While a car can move forward and back, and side to side, a plane can also move up and down, which means that there are more controls to manage to keep it stable.
However, the real trick of a plane isn’t flying, but landing. Figuring out how to slow the descent of the plane is tough, especially considering there aren’t nearly as many runways as there are roads.
3. Practice for Forty Hours
Much like with a road test, you’ll need to accumulate a certain amount of flight time before you can get a pilot’s license. You’ll need to fly with an instructor at first, but this won’t be the case forever.
If you manage to get your license, you’ll want to find a plane to fly. You should visit vref.com for more info on planes and what the best value is.
How to Fly a Plane
A lot goes into learning how to fly a plane. We’ve discussed some of the process in this article, but there’s much more to learn than we had space to talk about. It’s a good idea to more research on your own to make sure you’re really prepared.
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