Angle of attack (AOA) is defined as the acute angle between the chord line of the airfoil and the direction of the relative wind.
Relative wind is the direction of airflow produced by an object moving through the air. For an aircraft in flight the relative wind flows parallel and opposite to the direction of the flightpath. Basically, the relative wind is to the actual flight path of the aircraft, not the angle of the wing.
What is a cord line?
Since wings are curved, there needs to be a reference point to show how the wing is positioned to the airflow. The chord line is used as this reference, it is an imaginary line drawn from the wings leading edge to its trailing edge. The chord line doesn’t necessarily run through the center of the wing.
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