Cool Paper Airplane Facts

I bet you didn't know there were so many things that people have done with paper airplanes in the past. Here's just a few of them...

The Smallest Paper Airplane
The smallest origami paper model of a Crane Bird was folded under a microscope using tweezers by Mr. Naito from Japan and was made from a piece of paper 2.9 mm square. It is displayed on top of a sewing needle. Wow! That’s small – only problem is, it didn’t fly!

Upside Down Paper Airplane Flying
Any kind of paper aircraft that is trimmed to fly on earth will, when thrown inside a spacecraft, fly up and not down, as would normally be expected. This is because there is no gravity in the spacecraft, but there is lift created by the wings, as they fly in the atmosphere inside the spacecraft.

Fly on Forever
In space where there is no atmosphere, if a paper aircraft were thrown it would not fly at all; it would float away in a straight line. With no gravity to pull it down, it would possibly fly on forever until it hit an object.

Most Expensive – One of NASA’s
One of the most expensive and lightest paper aircraft ever flown, was the paper aircraft thrown inside one of NASA’s space shuttles, during a routine space flight. The fuel alone used to carry it into space makes that paper aircraft one of the most expensive. It was the lightest because of the lack of gravity in space.

To read more interesting paper airplane facts, click here.

Thanks to Andy Chipling for these cool paper airplane facts.