However, it would have to be a larger constant velocity for a wingsuit jumper without an extra person. With a larger mass, both the lift force and drag force would have to increase in order to keep the jumper at a constant velocity. Let's just assume that it is indeed the same to produce the same glide ratio. But lower terminal velocities are not why people wear wingsuits-they wear them so that they can fly.īut now for the real question: What would happen if you increase the mass of the flying object? In particular, what would happen to a wingsuit jumper with an extra person on top of them that essentially doubles the total mass? Well, according to this calculation the jumper would still have the same glide ratio-but that's only true if the lift-to-drag ratio stays the same. This means you can get a drag force equal to the weight at a much lower velocity. With a wingsuit, the area for the air drag is much larger. For a normal human (without a wingsuit) in a standard spread-eagle position, the terminal velocity is around 120 miles per hour (about 54 meters per second).
This means that for the rest of the fall they will move down at a constant speed. The net force will be zero and the humans will stop increasing in speed. But an increase in speed means there will now be a drag force pushing up in the opposite direction as the motion.Įventually, the falling people will reach a speed such that the drag force is equal in magnitude to their weight. That means they will increase in speed as they fall. (Yes, I know that's silly-but it's easier to explain.) Since they start from rest, the velocity with respect to the air is zero and the drag force is zero. So, what does this mean for our falling bad guys? Let's say they fall out of a stationary flying plane. Why is there a 1/2 in there? I'm pretty sure it's because the drag coefficient is defined in some other problem with a factor of 2 and no want wants two different drag coefficients.
In this expression we have the follow: ρ is the density of air, A is the area of the object, C is the drag coefficient, and v is the velocity of the moving object with respect to the air.
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