Open The Bomb Bay Doors

Animal troubles with math and science

Open The Bomb Bay Doors

You have your average run of the mill rhinoceros weighing in at 1,500 lbs. You have your average rectangular brick, red or white if you like. Red pleases me so red it is. The brick weighs 4.2 lbs. (give or take a point or a pound.)

You place your rhinoceros snugly inside the chamber of the high powered canon. The canon is situated face downward positioned at the bomb bay doors on a B52 bomber traveling 500 mph at an altitude of 30,000 feet so you want your rhino to be snug not tight and maybe even happy for the long trip down. You want it to stay in place when it is fired out of the aircraft. We want it to have a smooth safe ride when it is shot to the earth.

Alright, so it might be difficult to know if the animal is happy. How do we know if the beast might not be content with life in general? Perhaps suffering from some terminal illness or depression? It will certainly not be well after the high powered canon, terminal velocity and impact with mother Earth have their way with it.

Before you get all animal cruelty and animal rights on me and start reporting me to PETA and law enforcement, I want to remind you that this is simply a hypothetical experiment. It is science. Everybody likes science right?

Back to the brick: The red brick will be placed in a similar high powered canon next to the rhino canon so it will have to be affixed to the inside of the chamber with some string to keep it in place.

Both will be fired simultaneously straight downward from the airplane after the bomb bay doors are opened. Please remember to open the bomb bay doors.

Question: Will the rhino or the brick land at the same time? If they were both dropped from the plane instead of being ejected at a high rate of speed would they land at the same time and with the same impact? Will terminal velocity speed be effected in either instance?

My guess is that things are not going to end well for the rhino.