Fun_People Archive
2 Dec
Report from the Ballistic Pumpkin Review Board

Date: Fri,  2 Dec 94 02:00:11 PST
To: Fun_People
Subject: Report from the Ballistic Pumpkin Review Board

From: Claude Ginsburg <claude@espresso.rt.cs.boeing.com>
Subject: Re: Ballistic Pumpkins

Dear Sir:

Re: Your article on "Punkin' Chunkin'" that described the winning party
as blasting a pumpkin 2500 feet downrange with some kind of compressed
air cannon:

We have calculated, given the parameters in the article, that the 
pumpkins used in the exhibition have a ballistic coefficient of about
0.002. This means that the 2500 ft shot would need an initial velocity
of about 650 ft/sec, or 8 g's of acceleration. It probably is fair to say
that if a pumpkin is subjected to an 8g acceleration, it would be pumpkin
mousse within a fraction of a second. 

The veracity of the aforementioned article is, therefore, quite doubtful.
It's a great story, though.

© 1994 Peter Langston