The ground moving wile you hover ove rit in a helicopter?

Question

if a helicopter takes off and hovers over the same place where it took off for its max. time (amount of fuel in the tank), when it lands back on the ground, will it maybe be off a few centermeters or even a meter from where it took off, due to the earths rotation as the day goes along?

Answer 1

Nope, because the helicopter is and always was travelling as fast as the earths surface was spinning. So already at that speed, the earth cannot spin underneath.

This is also explained well with spacecraft trying to get out from the earths atmosphere, they always aim for an west to east exit out of the atmoshphere, due to the earths (west to east) speed on top of their speed gained from the acceleration of the rocket.

Answer 2

Only if the pilot maneuvers it that way.

The helicopter is in the atmosphere, which rotates with the earth.  So you would not notice the earth moving under you.  And many helicopters can stay up for periods like 4 hours, in which time a point on the earth would move thousands of miles, depending on your latitude.  But you would not feel the movement of the earth any more than you do sitting on your front porch.

Answer 3

Yes.

A Foucalt Pendulum does about the same thing.

http://www.astro.louisville.edu/foucault...

Answer 4

a better question would be-- Why does dropping a ball from a building....

--- People say gravity keeps everything even like that, but i'm still confuse on it.

I guess im stupid

Answer 5

Just to expand on the answers from aviophage and Mikaela...the definition of hovering is to maintain a fixed position above a certain point on the ground...regardless of the earth's and atmosphere's movement.  Even if the helicopter is pointed into a 100 mph headwind, as long as it is maintaing the same geographic position, then it is still in a hover with respect to the surface of the earth.

If the helicopter is moving relative to the earth's surface, then it is not in a hover.

The earth's rotation has no affect on aircraft including helicopters becuase the earth's atmosphere moves with the rotation of the earth around its rotational axix and the rotation of the earth around the sun.