At a recent rally, Donald Trump stated that electric planes would be a bad idea because you couldn't fly if it was cloudy . I guess “electric” equates to “solar energy” in the former president's mind—which, you know, is actually great. Just .
.. not so much for air travel.
Oh, solar planes have been around for a while, but they're probably not what Trump had in mind. These are ultralight aircraft, usually unmanned or carrying a single skinny pilot. It's very unlikely that you will ever be a passenger on a solar-powered plane that is delayed by clouds.
How can I be so sure? Because physics. Let's see why. What Makes a Plane Fly? The next time you're riding in a car, stick your hand out the window, flat, with your palm down.
You should feel a backward-pushing force from the interaction with the air. Now tilt your hand slightly up—don't resist, just let the air push your hand up. It feels like it wants to fly away, right? Your hand is just like a plane wing.
What's really happening here? Let's focus on one molecule of air interacting with your hand. The molecule starts at rest—its velocity ( v ) is 0, as shown in the diagram below. Then your moving hand-wing collides with that air molecule and pushes it so that it moves down and forward.
That molecule of air changed velocity, which means it accelerated. That means there must be a force ( F ) in the direction of the acceleration. (Newton's second law: F = m⋅a , where m is mass.
) This force on the air is from the ha.