Which falls faster from the same height, a human being or a cat, and why?

Question

Which falls faster from the same height, a human being or a cat, and why?

Answer 1

Humans will fall just as fast as cats in theory. same velocity. same gravity. But I dont know about human cats, they may come out alive just as cats with nine lives.

Answer 2

They may have the same acceleration but the cat has more surface area per volume so it falls slower or the air affects it more.

Answer 3

i say why dont u try it!!!!!  lol...jj   ::::::would be da same

Answer 4

It depends on where they are falling and on what you mean by a human being and a cat.

If they a falling in a vacuum (and you include dead bodies in the meaning of human being and cat, because neither can live in a vacuum), then they both fall at the same rate.

If they fall in air, then the terminal velocity of the cat will be less than the terminal velocity of the human being. The gravitational force causing them to fall is proportional to their mass. There is more force on the human than on the cat (assuming that we are not dealing with a very small baby human and a huge lion cat, in which case everything is reversed). The acceleration of the bodies is proportional to the force and inversely proportional to the mass, and so the masses cancel, and the acceleration from gravity is the same for each (assuming that gravitational mass and inertial mass are the same, which is a safe assumption for most purposes).

In air, falling bodies encounter a resisting force that is basically proportional to the surface area of the body multiplied by the square of the velocity. If you don't move in the air, there is no wind resistance. As a body falls in air, it accelerates (falls faster and faster) until the force resulting from the square of its velocity exactly balances the force from gravity. Then the body has reached its terminal velocity.

Because the wind resistance is basically proportional to the surface area and the gravity force is proportional to the mass, which is basically proportional to the volume of the body, we need to look at the relation between the surface area and the volume for the cat and the human being (and other animals, too, if you are interested).

Basically, surface area increases as the square of the size, and the volume increases as the cube of the size. You can think of the surface to volume ratio as, 1 to 1 for size 1, 4 to 8 for size 2, 9 to 27 for size 3, 16 to 64 for size 4, 25 to 125 for size 5, and so on. If we reduce these ratios to proper fractions, then we have 1 for size 1, 1/2 for size 2, 1/3 for size 3, 1/4 for size 4, 1/5 for size 5, and so on. These ratio numbers reflect the importance of the wind resistance relative to gravitational force for the falling body. So the terminal velocity is greater for a large size body (with the small surface to volume ratio number and smaller relative importance of the wind resistance).

In air, a mouse falls more slowly than a cat, and an elephant falls faster than a human being.

One important factor that we did not take into account is the shape of the body and aerodynamic effects resulting from that shape. You can perform useful experiments without dropping people and cats from the tops of tall buildings. For example, take two identical sheets of paper. They have the same mass. Crumple one of the sheets very tightly into a round ball. Drop them both from the same height at the same time. Which falls faster? This illustrates some of the effect of different shape (and therefore surface area) for objects of the same mass. It also tends to illustrate some aerodynamic effects related to shape. Why does the flat sheet bend and flutter? Why doesn't it fall straight down like the crumpled up paper ball? Another experiment: throw the crumpled up paper ball at someone across the room. If you're a good thrower, you might hit them with it. Now try throwing the uncrumpled flat sheet of paper across the room. Good luck!

Maple seeds fall really slowly in air. Sometimes I find maple seeds when I go out on the balcony of my apartment on the third floor. I always send them out and watch how they fall.

A golf ball and a pingpong ball are about the same size and shape, but the pingpong ball is hollow (has little mass for gravity to attract). Get a pingpong ball and a golf ball and drop them both from the same height. If you drop them a few inches onto a table, you probably won't see much difference. But if you drop them from near the ceiling onto the floor, you will probably notice a difference in how fast they fall.

Answer 5

They should both fall at the same speed but cats spread out their legs adding surface area and acting like a small parachute. Because of this they dont fall quite as fast.

Answer 6

Obviously neglecting air resistance both will fall at the same rate as speed of fall has nothing to do with mass or area of body (acc. to newton's laws of motion). But considering air resistance the cat will fall slower as it spreads all it's limbs parallel to the horizontal to increase it's surface area thus increasing time of fall by decreasing acceleration.

If you like my answer please vote it as the best.

Answer 7

They fall at the same speed.

First off, in an idealized experimental setup, ANY object will fall at the same rate as any other, provided the objects are in a vacuum. An anvil will fall at the same rate as a down feather in the absence of air resistance; this was experimentally demonstrated on the Moon when an astronaut dropped a hammer and a falcon feather side by side, and they landed simultaneously. (They fell more slowly than you're used to seeing on Earth because there's only one-sixth as much gravity on the Moon.)

The reason that a feather and a hammer don't fall at the same rate on Earth is because of air resistance. The ratio of surface area to weight of a feather is far, far higher for the feather, so the viscosity of the air stops its gravitational acceleration almost immediately. This can be stated equivalently by saying the "terminal velocity" of the feather is extremely low.

Terminal velocity is the falling speed at which aerodynamic drag is equal to the object's weight due to the interaction of its mass with gravity. People have a terminal velocity of about 200 km/h (that's 125 mph) so the only time we fall that fast and live to tell about it is skydiving with 10 seconds or more free-fall. While I haven't seen specific data on the terminal velocity of a cat, it would be in the same ballpark since a cat has about the same weight-to-drag ratio as a person.

So, from ANY height, a human and a cat will fall at very nearly the same rate. If it was a very, very high fall then either one might come out slightly ahead of the other by falling in a more streamlined position — but they'd both die on impact.

Answer 8

The human would fall faster on earth. This is because it has more mass. In a vacume though thay would fall at the same rate because thare is no gravity.

Answer 9

first u try it!!!!!!!!!**

a human being because i think human being has more inertia then a cat

**don't dare to try it!!!!!!!!@@@@@@@@@@@@@##########$$$$$$$...

Answer 10

Neither! They both fall at the same rate. Gravity pulls on both at the same rate. weight has no effect.

Answer 11

They all fall at the same acceleration (9.8 m/s^2) because that's the gravitational pull of the earth. They fall equally fast in a vacuum. IF you take into account air resistance, then its a different story.