• RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world
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    16 days ago

    Ive seen this claim a dozen times. It’s a disc shape. How this thing isn’t going to start flipping and curving its trajectory, or just plain old running out of energy due to air resistance, and not making it out of earth’s atmosphere is beyond me.

            • CheeseNoodle@lemmy.world
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              16 days ago

              tbf the calculated speed is actually roughly the minnimum based on its starting position and the frame it appeared in. it could have actually been going even faster.

              • Victor@lemmy.world
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                16 days ago

                I don’t count having no visual indication of the object as “tracking” it, if we’re talking semantics. One frame could equal an even faster speed than what it would minimally take to cross the entire width of the image at some trajectory vector. For other vectors, it could be (much) less (like not passing straight through the image from on side to the opposite side, e.g.).

                It’s important to not hang too hard on this as the escape speed is dependent on air resistance, or rather lack thereof. Those escape speed numbers are defined along with the assumption of zero air resistance or other forces acting on the object.

                • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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                  15 days ago

                  You can use the frame from before to calculate the MINIMUM speed. It could have been going even faster.

      • RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world
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        16 days ago

        If it’s like a frisbee, yeah, but it still curves. Now start it spinning like spinning a coin on edge. The curving will be much more dramatic.

      • merc@sh.itjust.works
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        15 days ago

        Throw it into water or gelatin. At thousands of metres per second the air is going to seem much more dense.