The day we took this picture Erika and I had paddling and we came back to school and Justin and Gavin were there. They took our paddles and tried to practice their strokes while sitting on the table. I never really thought of it at the time, but the reason why they didn't go anywhere, even with Gavin's big muscles and Justin's expert steering skills, was because the forces pushing back on the paddles weren't great enough to overcome the weight of the table. If they had been in the water they would have gone really far because of the water pushing back against the paddle, and because of the way the canoe is built and because of its weight. This is Newton's Third Law, for every action there's an equal and opposite reaction. The weight of the table makes the forces applied by the paddles almost negligible.
3 comments:
lol erin!!
these pictures are pretty funny
totally forgot about that!!
haha maybe we should ask Ms. Fuller if we can do this for paddling practice. these are pretty great pictures :)
This must make air-paddling in Denver way harder since there is a larger elevation and thus less air to push back on the paddle.
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