Parachute Essay

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Parachutes have long been an object of interest and renewed developments in human history. The idea of a man descending down from a great height without injuring himself, lead to the development of parachute science or its physics... Advertisement The word parachute is a combination of two words, 'para' which is a Latin word for 'against' and 'chute', which is a French word for 'fall'. The idea of a parachute is to cushion a fall. It is achieved by a combination of various physics concepts, which gradually developed over the years. Records of its use or attempts at parachuting have been traced as far back as the 9th century Chinese civilization. Significant developments and sketching of its design was vigorously pursued in Italy, during the pre-renaissance and the renaissance period. The most notable among the contributions in this field was that of Leonardo Da Vinci. Many of the future designs for parachutes were influenced by his work. The first ever flying trial was conducted in 1595 by Faust Vrancic, a Croatian inventor. Since that time, to the present day, its design and implementation has gone through innumerable changes due to developments in parachute science. Demystifying the Physics of Parachutes So how does it work? Consider a simple example to understand its working principle. If you drop a shut umbrella and an open umbrella (in the conventional position) from the top of a building, the closed one would fall quickly to the surface below, while the open one will fall slower, and with relatively much less force. A parachute works on similar lines. It cushions a fall due to greater resistance of air on the large surface area of the parachute fabric. This large surface area, made of a lightweight and flexible fabric, creates an air drag, which acts in opposition to the fall. The air molecules covered by the large surface area of the fabric tend to

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