Yael Marom, Nour Konsowa

How does changing the height we drop a

Introduction
The parachute is now a primary skydiving necessity. Did you ever wonder about the science
behind parachutes, or about how parachutes work? Well, parachutes actually have a very
interesting history. Long before we flew through the skies in man-made metal birds, men
were looking for ways to safely carry a human from the sky to the ground. For the most part,
DaVinci is the named inventor of the parachute. Parachutes have changed a lot from
Leonardo’s first quill to paper. That said, we contend the science behind parachutes today is
equally as captivating as those first mediaeval sketches. They mainly rely on air resistance to
perform. Parachutes take advantage of the principle of terminal velocity. Most parachutes
are designed to descend slower by dramatically increasing your aerodynamic drag or air
resistance. Thus, significantly lowering your terminal velocity. Terminal velocity is the
maximum velocity attainable by an object as it falls through a fluid. It occurs when the sum
of the drag force and the buoyancy is equal to the downward force of gravity acting on the
object. That is the science of a parachute but in my experiment I’m going to find out how the
height actually affects the time it takes it to reach the ground. My research question is “How
does changing the height we drop a parachute from affect the time it takes to hit the
ground?” My hypothesis is that the higher we drop it from the longer it will take to hit the
ground. I think that the time it takes it to hit the ground will be proportional to the height it is
being dropped from.

Equipment Amount

1) Stopwatch 1x

2) String 4x each 6cm

3) Measuring tape 1x

4) Scissors 1x

5) Paper cup 1x

6) Plastic bag 1x

7) Tape 1x

8) Long piece of string 1x

9) Marker 1x
Yael Marom, Nour Konsowa

Method
1. Collect the materials listed above
2. Using scissors poke 4 holes on the top of the paper cup
3. Double knot each string from one end
4. Thread the strings through the holes of the paper cup
5. Secure the strings in place with tape
6. Tie the strings to the hands of the plastic bag
7. Now you have finished the parachute the next steps are to measure the distance you
are going to drop the parachute from
8. Attach a weight to the end of a piece of string using a knot
9. Hold the top of the string on the side without the weight and drop the weight
attached to the string from the floor you are dropping from and then grab the lowest
part of the string that you can hold with the weight still touching the ground
10. Mark the part of the string that you grabbed it from with a marker
11. Measure the string from the end of the weight to the marking you put
12. Repeat this for each floor
13. Now you have finished the preparation and you can start the experiment
14. With one person on the floor you are dropping from and one person on the ground
floor the person on the floor you are dropping from will drop the parachute and the
person on the ground floor will measure the time it takes for it to hit the ground with
a stopwatch.
15. Repeat this until you have measured the time it takes to hit the ground from each
floor (1-3)
16. Repeat that 3 times from each floor to double check your findings

Here is an image of what your parachute should look like:

Hypothesis
I think that the higher we drop the parachute from the longer it would take to hit the ground.
I also think that the time it takes it to hit the ground is going to be proportional to the height
we drop it from.

Independent variable
Yael Marom, Nour Konsowa

The distance I drop the parachute from. I will measure it using a string, a marker, a weight
and a measuring tape (read method above).
Dependent variable
The time it takes the parachute to hit the ground. I will measure it using a stopwatch.

Controlled variables
● Temperature of room
● Same parachute
● Same measuring tape
● Temperature of equipment
● Same stopwatch
● Same item being dropped
● Same room

Safety precautions
● Be careful when using scissors
● Make sure that no one is under the parachute while it is being dropped
● Make sure no one is under the measuring weight while it is being dropped
● Be careful whilst going up and down stairs
● No running in the science lab
● Be careful with the measuring tape

Findings
Height (m) Try 1 (s) Try 2 (s) Try 3 (s) Average (s)

1st floor (4.83m) 3.1 2.8 2.7 2.87

2nd floor (9.66m) 4.46 4.13 3.71 4.1

3rd floor (14.49m) 4.91 5.08 5.42 5.14

Here is a graph with my findings:

Analysis
The graph is almost a straight line but there are some bumps which means that the time is
not proportional to the distance. In the first jump from the 1st floor to the 2nd floor the
distance was doubled but the time only went up by a factor of 1.43 as you can see in the
graph and table. Then for the 2nd jump from the 2nd floor to the 3rd floor the distance weant
up 1.5x but the time only went up with a factor of 1.25 which is once again less than the
difference in the height. I worked this out by dividing the new average speed in the table by
the one in the row above it.

Conclusion
In conclusion my hypothesis was close but it was not exactly correct. I thought that the
bigger the distance the longer it would take to hit the ground which is correct but also said
that the time the parachute takes to hit the ground is going to be proportional to the
distance and it was close but not exactly. I think this is because if everything was perfect
and there was no human error or anything to interfere then it would be proportional but
because that is not reality then it was not exactly proportional. Referring back to my
research question changing the distance you drop a parachute from affects the time it takes
it to reach the ground by taking longer to hit the ground and if there was no human error
than the the time it takes it to hit the ground will always be proportional to the height you
dropped it from.

Evaluation
The experiment mostly went smoothly. I handled time management really well. The
parachute was ready in advance so I had a lot of time to do the experiment and edit my lab
report. I had everything planned out so I could have as long as I needed to conduct my
experiment. What I would change next time is I would add more tries to ensure that human
error makes less of an impact on my results. Since it is very hard to press a stopwatch at the
exact time human error will always play a part but the more tries you have the more you can
reduce and I feel like this time it played too big a role in my results.

Bibliography
● California, Skydive. “The Science Behind Parachutes and How They Work | Skydive
California.” Skydive California, 24 Aug. 2020,
skydivecalifornia.com/blog/science-behind-parachutes.
● Wikipedia contributors. “Terminal Velocity.” Wikipedia, Sept. 2023,
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminal_velocity.