Tue 13 May 2008
A Plane On A Conveyor Belt
Posted by brett under offbeat, opinion, science
[5] Comments
I came across this interesting if nerdy physics thought experiment…
A plane is standing on a runway that can move (some sort of band conveyer). The plane moves in one direction, while the conveyer moves in the opposite direction. This conveyer has a control system that tracks the plane speed and tunes the speed of the conveyer to be exactly the same (but in the opposite direction). Can the plane take off?

