[geeks] Mac definitions

[Sandwich Maker]

" From: Bob <rjtoegel at verizon.net>
" 
" []
" 
" And when have you seen an engine pushed through the firewall?  I never
" saw one. Been to a lot of junkyards but may we're not so crazy in NJ.  I saw
" the imprint of the flywheel in the firewall of my friend's 70s car.  He was
" heading south doing about 45 mph on a highway with no divider when a
" drunk heading north doing an estimated 65 mph (from police report) hit him
" head on.  He spent two days in the hospital with cracked ribs and a cut knee.
" She walked away from her car (escorted by the police actually).  No air bags.
" Her car was older than his.

it's an urban folklore that bigger, heaver cars are safer, and it's
true to a point.   but counterintuitively, in this sort of crash
you're also safer if you're speeding.

speed was on her side -- k [kinetic energy] = mv^2.  if her car
weighed the same as your friend's, she was still carrying more than
double his kinetic energy, and all of that gets transferred to his
car, while his gets transferred to hers.  after subtracting his, she
still has positive k; after subtracting hers, his goes negative.
guess who gets the big delta-v...  that's why she walked away from the
impact.

back in the '70s, there was a long article in the new yorker by a
journalist whose wife was crippled in a crash like your friend's.
they were hit by a low-life habitual drinker in a no-insurance state.
i guess he was a mean drunk; when he was feeling particularly mean
he'd take his car - always a big cheap heap from a junkyard - and
prowl the back roads.  when he saw oncoming headlights he'd steer into
their side of the road and floor the accelerator, going as fast as
possible when he hit them.  he'd done it more than a few times at the
time of the article's crash.  i don't know why he was still at
liberty.
________________________________________________________________________
Andrew Hay                                  the genius nature
internet rambler                            is to see what all have seen
adh at an.bradford.ma.us                       and think what none thought