Watching the snow fall outside and thinking about terminal velocity, and how much less peaceful this whole scene would look without air resistance. ❄️💥
Terminal velocity is the final speed something reaches when falling through a fluid (like air). The force of gravity accelerates the thing, and air resistance slows it down (in proportion to the square of the speed), so at some point those things balance and it stops speeding up.
Terminal velocity for a raindrop is around 9 meters/second. For a snowflake it’s generally closer to 2 meters/second, depending on the size and fluffiness of the flake. (Some formulae here hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/airfri2.…)
For some reason the image has come into my head of what it would look like if snow just kept accelerating. A flake formed in a cloud 5000 feet up would hit the surface at half the speed of sound. A gentle flurry would be carnage. Snow angels would be a different color.
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