Where would the bullet land?

[tf15pin]

I disagree Challenge

The bullet is falling at its terminal velocity as soon as it leaves the gun. Falling for that long, the drag is going to eventually stop its forward motion, or nearly so.  Leaving you with only its downward terminal velocity.

I think a .50 is going to lose half its muzzle velocity in the first second, or 800 yards, beyond that it will be slowing rapidly.

Falling for over 30 seconds gives the bullet lots of time to shed minor forward movement via drag.

Interesting exercise!

In the vertical direction it is accelerating downward as soon as it leaves the gun, but terminal velocity is not achieved instantaneously. Gravitational acceleration is 32 ft/s^2. Terminal velocity would be when it accelerates to a speed (vertical) where the vertical component of drag is equal to the gravitational force.

Acceleration is how fast something is speeding up or slowing down. For the case of drag, when velocity is high so is drag, as velocity decreases so does the rate at which it is decreasing. What this means is that the bullet is slowing down the fastest when it first leaves the muzzle, so out at 800 yards it is actually slowing down slower than when it first starts off.

In the end I think it would still have several hundred ft/s horizontal velocity left in it when it got to the ground.

[hitech]

With the assumption that the bullet does not destabilize , I would think it would given the numbers below.

Alt                                 25k         45k
Launch Speed                 450mph    528mph
Secs to impact                65           97
Horizontal Distance          30858       55107
Plane Dist Traveled           42880       75082
Speed at impact.             444FPS     446FPS

HiTech

[FLS]

Is that going straight down at impact?

[hitech]

Is that going straight down at impact?

It had about a 10FPS fwd vel at impact.

[FLS]

Edit: Oops never mind. 

[Golfer]

With the assumption that the bullet does not destabilize , I would think it would given the numbers below.

Alt                                 25k         45k
Launch Speed                 450mph    528mph
Secs to impact                65           97
Horizontal Distance          30858       55107
Plane Dist Traveled           42880       75082
Speed at impact.             444FPS     446FPS

HiTech

Thanks Dale.

[Chalenge]

In the vertical direction it is accelerating downward as soon as it leaves the gun, but terminal velocity is not achieved instantaneously. Gravitational acceleration is 32 ft/s^2. Terminal velocity would be when it accelerates to a speed (vertical) where the vertical component of drag is equal to the gravitational force.

Exactly. I didnt believe it would hit the ground at terminal velocity (not having slowed to that point) but according to HiTechs results it does.

[hitech]

Exactly. I didnt believe it would hit the ground at terminal velocity (not having slowed to that point) but according to HiTechs results it does.

Yes and no , what happens is it never hits a terminal vel because that terminal vel is chaining as it is descending. It still had about 2fpsps deceleration at impact.

I think in real life the bullet would start tumbling fairly soon, I.E. around 20 secs. And then the terminal vel would be around 200 - 300 fps. And the drag co would increase immensely.

HiTech

[Killer91]

This may be a little off topic, but were there ever any injuries reported on the ground from falling bullets or spent cases from planes?

[FLS]

Yes and no , what happens is it never hits a terminal vel because that terminal vel is chaining as it is descending. It still had about 2fpsps deceleration at impact.

I think in real life the bullet would start tumbling fairly soon, I.E. around 20 secs. And then the terminal vel would be around 200 - 300 fps. And the drag co would increase immensely.

HiTech

So it would travel about 4 miles?    

[USCH]

This may be a little off topic, but were there ever any injuries reported on the ground from falling bullets or spent cases from planes?

knowing full well it was a lie the russians accused Heartman of killing a lot of people with the bullits that "missed" as he shot down aircraft.. seing as it is clearly possable (most notably from "gun claping" accedents) but I have never read of a recoded incedent of some one being killed from a bullit intended for air to air shots. But you would think... all them rounds... someone had to have been hit.... and what about all the flack as it fell? I never hear about that eather..

[Noir]

I guess a tater shell would still be dangerous after falling from 42k

[Chalenge]

knowing full well it was a lie the russians accused Heartman of killing a lot of people with the bullits that "missed" as he shot down aircraft.. seing as it is clearly possable (most notably from "gun claping" accedents) but I have never read of a recoded incedent of some one being killed from a bullit intended for air to air shots. But you would think... all them rounds... someone had to have been hit.... and what about all the flack as it fell? I never hear about that eather..

It had to have happened. We know it happened at Pearl Harbor.

[hitech]

Think hail stone.

[Chalenge]

True Hitech. Just like Mythbusters proved. At lower altitudes though...