Hello to everyone reading this post

I have a very simple question about gravity. We have seen planes flying at altitudes of around 35,000 ft. So if a plane takes of from Hongkong it will land in spain more quickly. And it will take more time if it travels form spain to hongkong.
This is bcoz of the rotation of the earth from east to west.

SO My question is if i happen to lift myself up in space by about say 2ft, will the earth pass by and say within a few hours spain will arrive automatically due to the rotation of the earth form east to west . And then i can land on the earth.

so why use planes in a east to west travel.....
or is there anything else.

First of all, Welcome to the forums. :)

Unfortunately you are wrong about the travelling time of aircraft. As the Earth rotates, everything in the atmosphere rotates with it at the same speed.
An Aircraft travelling from Spain to Hong Kong, will take just the same time to make the return journey (not taking into account high altitude trade winds and other meteorological factors)

The answer to your question is NO, if you lift yourself up, you will drop back down in exactly the same place, regardless of the time you spent airborne.

Simply, when you jump, you carry on moving with the same speed and in the same direction as you were when stood on the Earth, because nothing has happened to change that.

Objects in motion stay in motion, unless some force is applied to them. Check out Newton's laws of motion. So, you are moving when touching the Earth, and remain moving as you jump. Simple. A plane, therefore, has to use it's jets to move around, and there is no favourable direction.

Hi adils3d,


I have a very simple question about gravity. We have seen planes flying at altitudes of around 35,000 ft. So if a plane takes of from Hongkong it will land in spain more quickly. And it will take more time if it travels form spain to hongkong.
This is bcoz of the rotation of the earth from east to west.

The Earth's atmosphere rotates with the Earth. If it didn't, then the wind would always be blowing at 1000 km/hr or so. Since planes fly through the air, that aspect of Earth's rotation doesn't affect the flight.

There is, however, a small difference between flying East and West due to another effect called the Coriolis force. The upshot of that is that it requires slightly less fuel to fly West than to fly East. But it's a small effect.