Uploaded July 2022 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
This is the classic physics thought experiment: if you fire a gun horizontally and drop a bullet from the same height, which will hit the ground first? Another way to ask the question is how does the vertical part of a "shot" or horizontally launched object's motion compare to the behavior of a dropped object? This video shows a small steel ball released from the edge of a table the same instant another steel ball rolls off the edge.
It is clear that vertically they behave the same! Both balls have a vertical acceleration of -9/8m/s/s.
If you are interested in collecting data about the launched ball's horizontal and vertical positions for further analysis, see the 3 linked videos below...
Projectile Investigation #1 (Slow Speed): youtu.be/5tYd96TZOwE
Projectile Investigation #2 (Medium Speed): youtu.be/YiEOW9Ew5BU
Projectile Investigation #3 (Fast Speed): youtu.be/pJj9IUadjJs
This is the classic physics thought experiment: if you fire a gun horizontally and drop a bullet from the same height, which will hit the ground first? Another way to ask the question is how does the vertical part of a "shot" or horizontally launched object's motion compare to the behavior of a dropped object? This video shows a small steel ball released from the edge of a table the same instant another steel ball rolls off the edge.
It is clear that vertically they behave the same! Both balls have a vertical acceleration of -9/8m/s/s.
If you are interested in collecting data about the launched ball's horizontal and vertical positions for further analysis, see the 3 linked videos below...
Projectile Investigation #1 (Slow Speed): youtu.be/5tYd96TZOwE
Projectile Investigation #2 (Medium Speed): youtu.be/YiEOW9Ew5BU
Projectile Investigation #3 (Fast Speed): youtu.be/pJj9IUadjJs
