Archive for the ‘graphs’ Category

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6. If the pilot dies the control tower can talk you down.

May 22, 2023

So mathpigs, here is a small taste of what you would need to do to land a small aircraft in an emergency if the pilot is unconscious/dead.

A = Airspeed

Find airspeed indicator on instrument panel.

Instrument Panel Piper PA-28

Check speed.

Knots or mph or kph?

Avoid red zone. Too fast.

Knots outer scale. mph inner scale. Recommended velocity between blue & red.

B = Contact nearest air traffic controllers. 

1. Call MayDay MayDay MayDay

2.  Look for plane ID. It will be on instrument panel somewhere.

3. Check fuel.

On the Piper Cherokee there are 2 fuel tanks, R & L. Check both.

Check aircraft operating handbook to see fuel consumption and remaining time in air.

Quick calc.

 

C = Checklist

Follow Emergency Landing Checklist in aircraft operating handbook for Power OFF or Power ON landing.

Keep in mind, if your air speed is too low you can drop from air, but the higher the landing speed the bigger crash.

Crash energy increases with the square of speed. It’s a parabola!!!!!

The likelihood of a passenger with

NO flying experience landing a plane safely in an emergency is

very small.

The likelihood of a passenger with

NO MATHS skills landing a plane safely in an emergency is

ZERO.

 

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7. You can safely jump from a burning skyscraper/bridge/aircraft into water.

May 17, 2023

Angels and Demons (2009) Tom Hanks character, Robert Langdon, hero of Dan Brown’s jumps from a helicopter and falls thousands of feet into Rome’s Tiber River and survives, of course.

Ahhhh! Look up. It’s raining Tom Hanks!!!!!The Hulk (2003) The Hulk hops from the Golden Gate bridge onto a jet fighter, whose pilot tries to get rid of him at high altitude. The Hulk falls off and plummets many thousands of feet into the bay. He survives.

There are 2 factors we must consider when jumping or diving from a great height:

1. Surface Impact

2.Water depth 

1. Surface Impact

According to the Free Fall website falling into water is not a good survival strategy. 

‘Someone falling without a parachute from more than 2,000 feet or so would be falling quite a bit faster than 100 miles per hour (161 kph) The folks who have survived falls into water have had streaming parachutes above them, which probably slowed their falls to the 60 mph range (97 kph). Having a streaming parachute helps in another way because it aligns the body in a position where the feet enter the water first.’

The website goes on to explain that water is an INCOMPRESSIBLE FLUID. It’s like landing on concrete. Landing in mud, on snow, on trees, on circus tents etc helps break the fall. Moreover, jumping off a bridge into turbulent sea may be safer than jumping into calm water.

On 24th Oct 1930, Vincent Kelly, 31, while working on the Sydney Harbour Bridge fell 170 ft (52 m) into Sydney Harbour and survived.

A champion diver he did several summersaults and landed feet first. He broke a couple of ribs as he did not enter the water at a perfect RIGHT ANGLE but rather a few degrees off perpendicular..

2. Water Depth

The next issue is, if you are going to dive or jump into water from a great height and, miraculously, survive the impact, how deep should the water  be?

Olympic divers often practice their dives in a bubble pools (like a spa). This reduces the impact for a bad dive but the water must be much deeper. Sports Smart Canada recommends a water depth of double the height of the drop. But is this realistic if, say, you are jumping or diving from the top of a waterfall into aerated water.

You can work out approximate depths needed if you were jumping into calm water from heights such as below:

How deep do you plunge? The answer is surprising because, in fact, you decelerate really fast in water.

See REd Bull Jump Science here

Thanks to Rod Vance  for the Fluid Engineering Calcs (done by hand … not by computer program) for calculating the depth of water when your feet stop moving. That is the minimum depth of water needed for the jump (See graph below)

NOTE: Even with this fancy maths assumptions must be made about the transition epoch-half in/half out of the water.

 Assuming you survive the impact and you breath out through your nose – to stop water going up your nostrils really fast- then you will not go any deeper than approx 4 m or 13 ft from a platform of 20 m (65 ft) or less.

If you’re diving into water from, say, a helicopter as in the Demons & Angels movie you don’t need extremely deep water. Assume Langdon was at 100m (328 ft) or the height of The Statue of Liberty(above) or a 33 story building  when he jumped, then extrapolating the graph (above), maybe, a depth of 5m (16 ft) would do.

If you want to see what looking down from a 58.8 m (193 ft) platform looks like check out thisWorld Record Jump by Laso Schaller.

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10. You can out run a lava flow … METRIC

May 1, 2023

This is a rework of a previous post with full calcs.

Every volcano disaster movie from Volcano (1997) with Tommy Lee Jones to Dante’s Peak (1997) withDantes_peak_ver2Pierce Brosnan someone somewhere tries to out run a lava flow. Is this possible?

The answer is maybe. You will find everything you want to know about lava flows here.Volcano_ver2

On January 10,1977, at Nyiragongo lava sprang from the sides of the volcano moving at speeds up to 40 miles per hour (60 km/hr). About 70 people were killed.

lava temp Measuring the temperature of lava. Photograph by R.L. Christiansen, U.S. Geological Survey, January 9, 1973.
The fastest Lava flows recorded were in Hawaiiin 1950 when Mauna Loa erupted. The lava traveled at 10 kilometers per hour through thick forest. But once the lava flows became established and good channels developed, the lava in the channels was flowing at up to 97 kph.

Speed of average sprinter = 16 – 24 kph

 

Can you out run a lava flow?

You would be scorched after 3 minutes!!!! 

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10. You can out run a lava flow … USA UNITS

May 1, 2023

This is a rework of a previous post with full calcs.

Dantes_peak_ver2Every volcano disaster movie from Volcano (1997) with Tommy Lee Jones to Dante’s Peak (1997) with Pierce Brosnan someone somewhere tries to out run a lava flow. Is this possible?

The answer is maybe. You will find everything you want to know about lava flows here.Volcano_ver2

On January 10,1977, at Nyiragongo lava sprang from the sides of the volcano moving at speeds up to 40 miles per hour. About 70 people were killed.

 

lava temp Measuring the temperature of lava. Photograph by R.L. Christiansen, U.S. Geological Survey, January 9, 1973.

The fastest Lava flows recorded were in Hawaiiin 1950 when Mauna Loa erupted. The lava traveled at 6 miles per hour through thick forest. But once the lava flows became established and good channels developed, the lava in the channels was flowing at up to 60 mph.

Speed of average sprinter = 10 – 15 mph

Can you out run a lava flow?

 You would be scorched in 33 seconds!!!

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Outdoor Maths Adventures: Middle School

September 16, 2022

As the weather improves – Spring in Melbourne, my city & Fall in USA & Autumn in the UK – it is an ideal time to take math outdoors. Here are some fab exercises for Middle School Math.

Outdoor maths middle school 1 mathspig

Lego Man soccer fields will vary in size depending on the height of each player picked by each student. This does your head in. It is really challenging maths!

 

Outdoor Maths Middle School 2 Mathspig

McGill Uni link here.

Outdoor Maths MIddle School 3 Mathspig

Don’t forget to throw in Mathspig’s lame protractor jokes.

Outdoor Maths Middle School 4 mathspig

You’ll find full calculations at the Maths is Fun blog.

Outdoor Maths Middle School 5 Mathspig

You’ll find more fab outdoor junior and middle school maths activities at the terrific Maths and Movement blog.

Outdoor Maths Middle school 6 Mathspig

Some students will discover their co-ordinate point is not on the grid. Students should then work out that they will need a different scale for the y-axis. You can get more inspiration at the Stand Again blog.

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WINTER OLYMPICS 2022: One Rule Aerial Skiers Cannot Break

February 1, 2022


The Parabola Must Be Obeyed!!!!

Aerial skiers aim for height rather than length. Their aerial flight times are much smaller than ski jumpers so air resistance has minimal impact.

In fact, there is one law the aerial skiers cannot break. It is the law of gravity.

Here is an equation for  projectile motion from Wired magazine.

Screen grab from Wired Magazine

Screen grab from Wired Magazine

The equation for projectile motion also applies to Motorbike Jumps and Longbow Arrows.

Here is the x-y graph for different launch angles.

trajectory wired magazine

trajectory wired magazine

 

You can go to this page for complete calculations. Aerial skiers twist and turn but their CENTRE OF GRAVITY must follow this graph. More on centre of Gravity at The Great Back Pack Attack ie.

The centre of gravity of Aerial Skiers must follow a

parabolic curve.

Aerial Parabola final 2

Rocky Maloney Winter X Games Aspen

Rocky Maloney Winter X Games Aspen

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Death by Caffeine: The Math  Part 1 USA UNITS

November 26, 2021

Death by Caffeine: The Maths  Part 1 METRIC here

The lethal dose for caffeine is about 68 milligrams per lb of body weight. Average consumption of caffeine is about 200 milligrams a day. The Mayo Clinic advises against exceeding 500 to 600 milligrams per day.

 This work titled Timing is Everything is by street artist ABOVE in London.

You may want this much energy but be warned, energy drinks can kill.


It would take a ridiculously huge number of ANGRY WOMBAT energy drinks to kill a 14 year old weighing, say, 110 lb. Nevertheless, some kids are more sensitive to caffeine than others and then much lower levels of consumption of energy drinks can be fatal. 

See Death by Caffeine: The Math Part 2 USA UNITS

Here is the work (see below) TIMING IS EVERYTHING by street artist ABOVE in London showing the timing.

 

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I Can’t Sleep: Caffeine Math Part 3 USA UNITS

November 13, 2021

I Can’t Sleep Math: Caffeine Maths METRIC HERE.

Sensitivity to caffeine varies for individuals, but in healthy adults the half life for caffeine is approx 6hrs meaning your body eliminates half the caffeine you have drunk in 6 hrs. Ref: Caffeine Pharmacology

Caffeine interferes with sleep. One study found that consuming caffeine 6 hours before bedtime reduced total sleep time by 1 hour.

Caffeine content sources Caffeine Content Data Base

Street art by JEKS, South Carolina

The Half life equation is an exponential function.

The Mayo Clinic advises up to 400mg Caffeine a day for adults, which would be;

10 black teas

7 instant coffees

4 cappuccinos

2 dark roast brewed

less than one cup of Black Insomnia Coffee.

Approx half this amount of caffeine for 14 yos.

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I Can’t Sleep: Caffeine Maths Part 3 METRIC

November 13, 2021

I Can’t Sleep: Caffeine Math USA UNITS HERE.

Sensitivity to caffeine varies for individuals, but in healthy adults the half life for caffeine is approx 6hrs meaning your body eliminates half the caffeine you have drunk in 6 hrs. Ref: Caffeine Pharmacology

Caffeine interferes with sleep. One study found that consuming caffeine 6 hours before bedtime reduced total sleep time by 1 hour.

Caffeine content sources Caffeine Content Data Base

Street art by JEKS, South Carolina

The Half life equation is an exponential function.

The Mayo Clinic advises up to 400mg Caffeine a day for adults, which would be;

9 black teas

6 instant coffees

4 cappuccinos

2 dark roast brewed

less than one cup of Black Insomnia Coffee.

Approx half this amount of caffeine for 14 yos.

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2D Random Walk and a Drunk Mathematician

July 9, 2021

The random walk is a way to create a path based on random decisions at junctions. If you’ve played a procedurally generated video game, including major examples like Minecraft and Stardew Valley as well as cult favorites like Spelunky and Dwarf Fortress, you’ve encountered a random walk in the form of a dungeon or terrain made this way in the programming. More @ Popular Mechanics

2D Random Walk math helps game programmers to plot interesting pathways in games like Minecraft Dungeons. (above)

Plot a 2D Random Walk

There are 4 choices:

UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT

Note: This 2D random walk is limited to a 1-unit step length and right angles turns.

Set the Random Number Spinner here to 4 and generate 8 random moves of 1 unit and plot the moves on the worksheet(below).

1  up

2  down

3  right

4  left

Printable Worksheet: 2D Random Walk Worksheet

Here are 5 X 8 step 2D Random Walks.

These 2D Random Walks do not look like the path taken by a drunk mathematician.

Drunken Mathematician 

This looks like a drunken mathematician and the 2D Random Walk for a drunk mathematician would look like pathways shown below with variable step lengths and turns from 0-360°.

All Random Walks can be mathematically modeled. eg. Go to MIT here. This math can be quite complicated (See here.) But all we want to do is plot the 2D Random Walk to see random numbers in action.