this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2024
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Science Memes

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[–] Jarix@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (9 children)

Bigger/faster the bullet the easier it was for water to stop. The small rounds from handguns worked best for shooting into water.

It makes sense once they do the maths but it was a great episode

[–] FuglyDuck@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (5 children)

It isn’t that the water is stoping the bullet- rather that water’s surface tension creates a shockwave that shatters the bullet, and this distributes the mass over more fragments.

Lower power cartridges are able to survive that shockwave, or it fragments into fewer slugs which keeps its energy concentrated.

Either way, I wouldn’t want to be near the high powered cartridge hitting the water. You’re going to feel that shockwave.

[–] Jarix@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (4 children)

It is the water breaking it. The water doesnt compress so the water doesnt absorb enough of the kinetic energy fast enough so the bullet fractures. As i understand it anyway. The 50cal is travelling a lot faster so a lot more force is applied on the bigger rounds.

Later on they did a dynamite fishing one and we learned being in water when a large enough shockwave hits is VERY bad for internal organs of squishy creatures in it

[–] ultratiem@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago

Dynamite in water is the same basic principle used for sea mines. History has taught us those actually work. With the bullet, it’s more about surface tension which makes sense as falling from a high enough cliff onto water if you don’t land right is nearly the same as falling onto concrete.

Cool stuff regardless and I always found their testing to be quite spot on, scientifically.

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