At around 21:00 on July 19, a group of people dancing in the Rongqiao Huazheng neighborhood in Wuhan’s Wuchang District were suddenly alarmed by a loud smashing sound nearby. It was found that a couple on the 26th floor of an apartment building were having a row, with a poor desk lamp being the first casualty thrown out of the window. Soon after, four boxes (you know, the kind that hold around ten packs or so) of cigarettes were then thrown out of the window, and were strangely picked up about five minutes later by what was presumably the girlfriend involved in the argument. The story kind of ends there, so what’s weird about this I hear you ask?
Well, after a reporter published a story about the disturbance, the incident saw an unexpected comment from a physics teacher at a nearby middle school who seems to be hinting that the couple should be charged for attempted murder. But for what? The lamp comes into mind, as surely anything that came into direct impact with that thing if it fell from the 26th floor is bound to be in trouble. Yet the teacher claimed that the cigarettes were the real danger here.
The teacher stated that if a box of cigarettes, which weighs around 300g, was thrown off the 26th floor of an apartment building (around 80m high), it would reach a terminal velocity of around 40 meters per second. If it came into contact with a person, the resulting force would be an impact of around 12kg, which could easily kill a human.
So there you have it: further proof that smoking kills folks.
Source: China News
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Keywords: falling cigarettes murder
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they score so high i sciences but do not understand it . in america we all know about the penny thrown off a tall building.
Jul 26, 2013 07:44 Report Abuse
Apology, but short & sweet, no cigarette box weighs 300g. My practical applied knowledge of chemistry leads me to believe the most densely pack of 20 would be at most 180g including packaging. I seriously doubt any pack weighs 300g. That is nearly 1/3 kg. We are not all scientifically ignorant. This report or this reported calculation is seriously wrong as it would never be near 12kg of foroce. Come on!, pack of cigarettes thrown off a commercial airline would probably just give you a a brief headache.
Jul 22, 2013 22:37 Report Abuse
It was a carton of cigarettes, not a packet. The math is correct (allowing for resistance, that's why it's called "terminal" velocity). If you were hit on the head by a CARTON of cigarettes thrown from the 26th floor it could kill you.
Jul 23, 2013 22:34 Report Abuse
the stupid teacher does not know there is something called Air resistance????
Jul 22, 2013 19:52 Report Abuse
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