Free Fall

During my last flight, my wife pondered how long it would take to fall to the ground. I thought for a minute and responded "about 3 minutes." I happened to know that planes fly around 33,000 feet and that a sky-diver, with their belly down, falls about 120 miles per hour. After a few sloppy conversions, I was about to round out my number and have a decent guess.

If you are like my wife, you are likely wondering why I would know the terminal velocity of a skydiver off the top of my head. Engineering would be an obvious answer but it was actually thanks to a TV show I had seen recently. I was watching people ski down a crazy steep mountain for the speed-skiing record. After watching, I confirmed my suspicion that it was faster than belly, free fall and conveniently had the number in my head to impress my wife.

In The Beginning

int main ()
{
    cout << "Hello World!";     
    return 0;
}