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Author Topic: What goes up will come down......  (Read 724 times)

Offline bullit

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Offline armed and humorous

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Re: What goes up will come down......
« Reply #1 on: January 02, 2012, 01:39:54 PM »
I thought Myth Busters determined that this kind of thing was highly unlikely (busted).  I guess that was more for bullits shot straight up, though, and this may have been more horizontal.  Talk about bad luck.

Miles away?  Must have been a pretty high-powered rifle if that's the case.  I realize bullits can travel that far from less powerful guns, but to still have penetrating power, I don't know.
Gun related issues are, by nature, deadly serious.  Still, you have to maintain a sense of humor about them.

Offline bullit

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Re: What goes up will come down......
« Reply #2 on: January 02, 2012, 01:45:20 PM »
The law of physics baby...."terminal velocity" no pun intended. 

Offline armed and humorous

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Re: What goes up will come down......
« Reply #3 on: January 02, 2012, 03:26:29 PM »
I'm not saying I totally buy the Myth Buster's explanation, and before watching it, I would have thought those celebratory rounds being fired pretty much straight up, would have had lethal consequences when they came down.  After watching their demonstrations, I'm not so sure.  It appeared that the bullets had very little penetrating power upon impact back down on earth.  Apparently "terminal velocity", when you figure in air resistance, is much less than muzzle velocity.
Gun related issues are, by nature, deadly serious.  Still, you have to maintain a sense of humor about them.

Offline bullit

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Re: What goes up will come down......
« Reply #4 on: January 02, 2012, 06:06:43 PM »
It was a bad joke.  Terminal velocity would be significantly less than muzzle velocity.   I'd include the formula for calculating, but I am lucky to be able to type the alphabet.  Hopefylly SFG is lurking out there and will give us the engineer's point of view (they are closet physicists).  :)