I was recently flying on an A380 and from my window seat, I could see the vast expanse of the wing. It was HUGE – you could play badminton (or cricket for those who are familiar) on it.
And I just couldn’t fathom how it holds up with most of its length having no support. It’s carrying the weight of thousands of litres of fuel and two large engines, while being subjected to all the forces there would be while taking off, landing, and in-flight banking, turbulence, etc.
What is the engineering that causes them to not break?
In: Engineering
Actually in flight, it supports itself. The aerodynamic force on it is more than sufficient to hold it up.
The impressive part is that it’s capable of holding the rest of the plane up while in flight, and that on the ground, the rest of the plane can hold IT up. Most structures aren’t required to have to direction of load reverse itself like that. Wings are.
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