This text is primarily concerned with analytical solutions of airplane flight
mechanics problems. Its design is based on the precepts that there is only one
semester available for the teaching of airplane flight mechanics and that it is
important to cover both trajectory analysis and stability and control in this
course. To include the fundamentals of both topics, the text is limited mainly
to flight in a vertical plane. This is not very restrictive because, with the
exception of turns, the basic trajectory segments of both mission profiles and
the stability calculations are in the vertical plane. At the University of Texas
at Austin, this course is preceded by courses on low-speed aerodynamics and
linear system theory. It is followed by a course on automatic control.