The Physics of Bungee Jumping
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The physics behind the activity known as bungee jumping is fairly understandable. A bungee jumper jumps off a high structure, falls vertically downwards until eventually being sprung back up by the elastic bungee. The jumper is then left bouncing up and down, until the energy from the activity is dispersed.
Once the bungee jumper takes his or her leap of faith and begins their thrilling journey down, physics steps in. While falling, with the help of gravity, the bungee jumper accelerates, shockingly to the point where it even exceeds the free fall acceleration due to gravity, 9.8 m/s/s. The bungee jumper as well as the bungee itself are always in contact with other forces during the fall, which will be investigated in detail. We will take a further look to the physics concepts that are being applied to all aspects of the fall, including the downward fall, the point at which the string is completely stretched out, and the final spring back upwards. |