Research Paper Example: Skydiving and Science Advancement

Theories and concepts that make skydiving (free-fall) significant to science advancement

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

How skydiving (Free-fall) plays an integral part in the development of future ideas or inventions in Physics

Impact on society

The advantage of educating society about Skydiving (Free-fall)

Conclusion

References

Introduction

Skydiving is one of the recreational activities that is enjoyed by many people in their leisure times and comprises of free fall in the air with a parachute backup behind their backs. However, most skydivers are not familiar with the major concepts behind skydiving as they just do it for fun. There is a load of physics concepts and theories that come up with this phenomenon, starting from the forces that act on the skydiver to the velocity that he accelerates with as he or she moves through the air (Mei-Dan, 2013). The acceleration is as a result of the force of gravity that keeps on pulling him down which in turn causes the speed to keep on increasing with time (Greening, 2013). The more the speed, the more the resistance forces act on him. This study will explore the physics behind skydiving as well as the physics concepts and theories that are involved. More so, it will expound on how the physics behind skydiving can be incorporated into the development of future ideas and innovation and its impact on the society.

General discussion

Skydiving is one of the examples of free fall. By definition, free fall is the motion at which a body or objects move at, where the only force acting upon it is gravity. As much as skydiving is considered to be a free fall, it is acted upon by two forces, the force of gravity and the force due to air resistance that is dragging the skydiver upwards. An object free-falling towards the earth normally accelerates at a speed of about 9.8m per second every second (Reichardt, 2015). In relation to skydivers, they reach a velocity referred to as terminal velocity as a result of the resistance from the air they experience as they fall. Skydiving incorporates physics in it as it involves gravity and air resistance interactions. First, after the skydiver jumps out of the plane, he immediately starts accelerating as he or she moves downwards with increasing speed over time and eventually reaches terminal velocity, the speeds which balance the drag that the skydiver experiences from the air resistance and the force of gravity pulling him down. Terminal velocity can be explained by further understanding as shown below in correlation to skydiving.

Terminal velocity

This is the maximum velocity that a certain object can reach while falling through the air. If air resistance were not there, an object would accelerate towards infinity. It acts on all bodies but the rate at which the velocity reach on an object depends on the surface area to mass ratio (Greening, 2013). For instance, a feather released from higher grounds would fall much slower and reach a terminal velocity much sooner than an elephant thrown from the same height. This is because, despite gravity acting on both equally, the feather has a greater surface area to mass ratio and therefore will reach the terminal velocity much sooner. This concept of terminal velocity was explained in Newton's second law of motion that makes to easier for someone to figure out when a body will reach its terminal velocity (Ryan, 2014). When a body is falling down, and the resistance it gets from the air is equal to the downward force (mg), the total force acting on the object equals to Zero. Force is calculated as mass times acceleration, and therefore, in this case, the mass is constant hence acceleration must then be equal to zero. Thus velocity is now considered constant since it has reached its maximum.

Calculating terminal velocity in skydiving

15570201397000

g262890015684500 D

84518518034000

13335011747500 D35052001333400

2571750825500828675825500v M M

Vt W WTerminal speed

(2)

D<W D<W

v is increasingv=Vt=constant

Where g is the acceleration as a result of gravity which equals to 9.8m/s

M is the mass

D resistance force that is acting upwards on the skydiver

W is the gravitational force pulling the skydiver downwards

v is the speed he or she falls with.

Vt is the Terminal speed which is constant; the skydiver reaches when the force that is dragging him upwards is equals to the force of gravity that is pulling him downwards.

In the above essence, it's efficient and easier to understand why the speed of the skydiver increases when the drag force acting on him upwards is greater than the force of gravity that is pulling him downwards. Using Newton's law of motion, PSF=ma, and PSF= W-D and so the acceleration that acts on him is positive, and therefore it means v likewise significantly increases with time (Behl & Deshmukh, 2015)

This comes up with the general equation for drag that acts on the skydiver as:

D= (1/2) CpA (v*v)

Where:

C = drag coefficient which happens to be varying and dependant on the skydiver's speed. However, typical values are from 0.4- 1.0 for different fluids, for instance, water and air (Reichardt, 2015).

P = density of the fluid through which the diver is moving and in this case the fluid is air.

V = this is the skydiver's speed which is relative to the fluid (Air).

A = projected cross-section area of the skydiver which is perpendicular to the direction of flow.

The force of gravity that is acting on the skydiver is:

W=mg

This is the force that pulls him or her downwards causing an increase in speed.

When the terminal velocity is reached, drag force acting on the skydiver is equals to the force of gravity that is pulling him or her down which then leads to the equation below:

mg=1/3CpA (v*v)t

Therefore when calculating for the terminal velocity

Terminal velocity (v)t= Square root of 2mg/CpAAccording to the above calculation it's clearly seen that terminal speed increases with the decrease of the cross-section area A of a body (Armano et al., 2016). This means that if the skydiver wants to increase his or her speed and catch up with the rest, he or she has to decrease his value A by re-orienting his body with the head facing downwards to remain streamlined. This way, the air resistance that will be acting on him will be less, and therefore his speed will accelerate significantly.

Drag force

This force is the one that resists the skydiver from accelerating in an abnormal or rather an extraordinary speed in the air (Armano et al., 2016). Actually, it is like normal air resistance. It resists the skydiver and likewise moves in a similar direction as him, That is, downward direction.

221869024765000

18573752470150 F norm

119062521209000278066520256500F frict F app

235458016446500

F grav

Once the skydiver reaches the terminal velocity, it's still unsafe to land with such speed, and hence less pace is required. In this case, for him to slow down, a higher resistance force is needed which must be greater than the downward force. This is where the parachute is needed, and the skydiver pulls it out and a result the air resistance becomes greater than the gravitational force causing him to slow down (Reichardt, 2015). The diver now reaches a new Terminal velocity which is now safe for him to land.

Physics plays a vital role in other science areas that are related to skydiving. For instance, in constructing a vehicle, the manufacturer makes it in a way that it can have less air resistance so that it can move with ease and less resistance from the air. However, there are theories and concepts that make skydiving significant to science advancement. One of them is Galileo Galilei concept that states that the speed of free fall is independent of the mass (Ganan-Calvo, 2014). He had proven his basic mechanics severally through selecting objects randomly and dropping them from a tall building and observe them as they land. Finally, he concluded that when air resistance is neglected, the mass doesn't matter and objects dropped from a point above the ground would hit the floor at the same time. Moreover, he determined that the acceleration of these bodies is constant. Another theory is the Einstein general theory of relativity. This theory states that, what is perceived as the force of gravity come from the curvature of space and time (Kincanon, 2013). He depicted that the laws of physics are similar for all non -accelerating observers and that light speed in a vacuum was not dependent on the observer's motion. Moreover, he concluded through a range of statistics he had made that big objects cause space-time distortion, which eventually is felt as gravity. Another person who brought about expounding on physics where skydiving can be applicable is Isaac Newton's who formulated the three laws of motion. In his second law of motion, he said that the net force acting between two bodies depends on their mass as well as the distance that separates them. This means that for skydivers, even if the center of gravity on earth is pulling them downwards, the center of mass is pulling back at the earth. Moreover, in his third law, he depicted that for every action there is a reaction.The skydiver experiences gravitational pull as well as air resistance force, therefore, justifying newton's fact.

The physics behind sky diving is an important scientific finding that can assist in the development of future ideas in one way or the other. Based on the way objects react differently to air resistance, this concept of skydiving can be used to make airplanes using materials that will tolerate the air friction or rather will collide with the air less. Terminal velocity is dependent on the surface area to mass ratio and therefore engineers who make airplanes should use physics concepts and theories by making them as streamlined as possible for ease to navigate through airspace without too much of air resistance. Elon musk used physics principles where he even sent the first rocket to mars (Ganan-Calvo, 2014). According to him, approaching things in a physics framework teaches one to reason from first principle rather than analogy. He thought of making his own rocket a project that would later be considered as SpaceX. He used the Newton's first, second and third law to build his own rocket. Before firing the rocket, it remained in its state of rest, Airspeed zero. After the engine was fired, thrust increased from zero and the weight significantly decreased as fuel burned. When the thrust became greater than the weight the rocket, it accelerated upwards, and the velocity increased. The second Newton's law of motion which basically mentions on free fall can be used too to calculate all the forces acting on every square inch of every brick in one's house (Behl & Deshmukh, 2015). The same law was the one that Elon musk used to identify the forces acting on the rocket. The same idea could be used by swimmers in swimming competitions. Swimmers could reduce their cross-section areas to keep their velocity and therefore move faster. If they make big movement in the water, there are chances of them slowing down due to movement of large amounts of water.

Impact on society

Educating the people in the society on the basics behind skydiving will have them equipped with the...