Extreme Wingsuits With Physics
By mkumo_1
· 7,931 views
There is a lot of physics behind the wingsuit. Not only is it interesting in how it works but it also looks like loads of fun and I personally would love to do this. Getting back to the physics, it is a really a matter of gravity and aerodynamics which was touched upon in my last post. One of the most common things that you can tie to this is gravity and all of the basic kinematic equations. At what velocity does a wing suit actually travel? A wingsuit actually travels anywhere from 60 to 260 kilometers per hour. In meters per second thats roughly 17 to 72 meters per second. This all depends on the up drafts of the wind tht could either be going at you or away from you. Usually they tend to drop from 12000 feet and they dont open their parchute until about 3000 feet. The basic equations that we learned do not account for the surface area of the suit or the winds so it is kind of hard to determine their speed. If they just fall freely from a plane they can travel around an avarage of 8 kilometers horizontally from where they started their fall. The wingsuit also uses other principles that we havent really touched upon in regents physics but are really the science behind what is happening. Lift which I talked about last time is what allows the wingsuit to really take flight. Other principles like thrust and drag all play a role in the glide ratio. The glide ratio is the amount you move horizontally to vertically when you're free falling. I hope you enjoyed this post.
For more info go to http://adventure.howstuffworks.com/wingsuit-flying1.htm
Now here's another video, this one is of Alex Polli doing some extreme wingsuiting.
Recommended Comments