A plane takes off at St. Louis, flies straight to Denver, and then returns the same way.

Question

The plane flies at the same speed with respect to the ground during the entire flight, and there are no head winds or tail winds. Since the earth revolves around its axis once a day, you might expect that the times for the outbound trip and the return trip differ, depending on whether the plane flies against the earth's rotation or with it. However, under the conditions given, the two flight times are identical. WHY?

Answer 1

Here is an important point to understand:

EARTH's ORBIT DOES NOT AFFECT FLIGHT TIME

The Earth's orbit has no direct effect on flight time. The planes do not actually fly through space but they fly through the air. For example Earth moves at about 5000m/s but a balloon moving in the air does not travel at 5000m/s. The atmosphere rotates with the air where the balloon moves through this air. You can imagine 2 different things moving, the Earth moving with its atmospher moving on top. though the earth's moves quickly as seen by the rapid changes of the continents if you were on the moon. the atmosphere may not even change when it is moving. the plane would be moving through this shell of atmosphere which isn't moving much at all so expect flight speeds to be similar