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April 12, 2007
The Physics of Superhero Comic Books (Dr. Dobb's)
For instance, as Kakalios recently pointed out in his lecture "The Uncanny Physics of Superhero Comic Books" that was part of the MIT Physics Colloquium Series, when the Green Goblin kidnapped Spiderman's girlfriend, Gwen Stacey, and pushed her from the George Washington Bridge to her death, was it the fall that killed her or Spidey's attempt to save her by catching her in webbing mid-fall, causing her neck to snap? In fact, this was a question Kakalios posed to his students in an introductory physics exam.
The answer? According to Kakalios, if Gwen has a mass of 50 kilograms, fell 300 feet, and acquires a velocity of 95 mph, there would be 10g of force on her body, which she could potentially survive. But stopping short against all that force in half a second would break her neck. In other words, when she hit the web, the impact on her body would have been 10 to 20 times the force of gravity. "That proved -- mathematically at least -- that Gwen Stacey died of a neck snap when Spider-Man caught her in his webbing," he says. -Jon Erickson
Posted by kuechebj at April 12, 2007 11:28 PM