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Why a cannonball fired hard enough never lands: Newton's cannon and the orbit
Fire a cannonball horizontally from a mountaintop and it lands some distance away. Fire it harder and it lands farther. Fire it hard enough and the Earth's…
Why soap bubbles swirl with colour, then turn black just before they pop
Soap has no dye, yet bubbles shimmer with magenta, gold and green. The colour comes from thickness: light bounces off both the front and the back of the film…
Why astronauts float: the space station never stops falling
Astronauts on the International Space Station look weightless, but at 400 km up, Earth's gravity is still about 90% as strong as on the ground. The trick is…