An airplane carries 320 passengers from Phoenix to Los Angeles flying at an average speed of 490 miles per hour. On the return flight, the plane carries 164 passengers and travels at the same average speed. What happens to the plane's kinetic energy?

Question

An airplane carries 320 passengers from Phoenix to Los Angeles flying at an average speed of 490 miles per hour. On the return flight, the plane carries 164 passengers and travels at the same average speed. What happens to the plane's kinetic energy?

Answer 1

The kinetic energy of an object is equal to 0.5 times the mass of the object times its velocity squared.

Assuming the mass of the airplane remains constant, the only factor affecting the kinetic energy is the velocity of the airplane.

Since the velocity remains the same on both flights (490 miles per hour), the kinetic energy of the airplane does not change regardless of the number of passengers on board.