FLYING A PLANE
The pilot uses many controls in the cockpit to fly a plane. The pilot pulls a wheel or stick back to make the plane go up. Air rushing over and under the wings lifts the plane into the sky. Dials on a control panel in the cockpit tell the pilot how high the plane is, how much fuel it has, and which direction it is heading. A radar screen tells the pilot if other planes are nearby. The pilot uses the rudder on the tail and the ailerons on the wings to make the plane turn.
HOW PLANES LAND
It’s time to land the pilot pushes the wheel or stick forward to make the plane go down. The pilot lowers the wheels and landing gear. The plane touches down on the runway. The pilot uses brakes to slow and stop the plane.
THE WORK OF AIRPLANES
Planes do different kinds of work. Passenger planes carry people in the cabin. Cargo planes carry packages, boxes, and other things. Cargo planes do not have seats. Military cargo planes can carry soldiers, tanks, and cannons. Some military planes are fighter jets. Some are bombers. Some military jets take off and land on aircraft carriers at sea. Certain military planes can take off straight up like a helicopter, then fly ahead like a plane. Crop-duster planes spray farm fields with chemicals that kill bugs or fertilizer that helps crops grow. Firefighting planes drop water or chemicals on forest fires. Seaplanes have skis instead of wheels. They can land on lakes in faraway places to deliver passengers, supplies, and mail.
BIG AND SMALL PLANES
The smallest airplanes are called ultra lights. They weigh about 100 pounds (about 46 kilograms) and carry only a pilot. The biggest planes are jumbo jets. They can carry several hundred people and several hundred tons of cargo. Jumbo jets fly long trips over oceans. In between, there are planes of many sizes. There are two-seater and four-seater propeller planes. There are commuter planes that can carry about 20 passengers on short trips. Airlines also fly many jets that hold from 80 to over 400 passengers.
THE FIRST AIRPLANES
Long ago, people dreamed of flying like the birds. They tried to build machines that would fly. The first people to succeed were two American brothers, Orville and Wilbur Wright. They made a heavier than air machine of wood and cloth. It had an engine that turned a propeller. The brothers made their first flight near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, on December 17, 1903. The Wright brothers and other inventors experimented with different designs. They made better and better planes. The first warplanes flew during World War I (1914-1918). Then, pilots started taking passengers on trips. Jet engines in the 1950s made air travel faster and made passenger planes very popular, now millions of people travel everywhere on airplanes. Airplanes of Tomorrow, Today, there are planes that can fly as fast as the speed of sound. Inventors hope to make planes that can fly five times faster than sound. They want these planes to fly up to the edge of space. Then the planes will come back down and land. They call these planes hypersonic planes. Today, it would take you more than 12 hours to fly from Chicago, Illinois, to Tokyo, Japan. In a hypersonic plane, you could make that trip in two to three hours.
This article was culled from the publications of Deen Communication Limited