Sunday, 21 December 2014

If a penny dropped from a high distance would it kill you?

If a penny dropped from a high distance would it kill you?
If it dropped from a high enough distance, it would if its terminal velocity were higher than the speed necessary to kill a person. Since coins are small and more aerodynamic, the terminal velocity would be higher than a larger, flatter object, making it sort of like a bullet.

The weight of a penny would be a function of it's acceleration. If the penny is still, that acceleration would be that of gravity, more or less 9,8 m/s.s or 1 G.

You take the mass of a penny (in kg) and multiply it by the acceleration (in m/s.s) to get the weight in Newtons (which is force).

So, a falling penny would be going 9,8 m/s faster every second before reaching its terminal velocity. The main point is the final velocity will be very high since it's a small and for all practical purposes, an aerodynamic object and therefore the kinetic energy will be very high as well. So will the force, which depends on the acceleration and the Work, which will be the very high transference of energy from the penny to somebody's head.

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