Not only is Angry Birds a mainstream, blockbuster success, it turns out that scientists and physicists have been keeping an eye on it as well. Using the popular Tracker video analysis tool, physicist Rhett Allain analyzed the behavior in space of Angry Birds’ most important characters - the birds.
Yes, it is that simple. The only force acting on the bird (if the bird is not moving too fast) would be the gravitational force from the Earth. This is where I see lots of intro-student mistakes. They tend to want to put some force in the horizontal direction because the bird is moving that way. DON’T do that. That is what Aristotle would have you believe, but you don’t want to be in his club. There is no horizontal force in this case – no air resistance.
What about the vertical motion?
That is one big ole sling shot, 5 meters tall? Wow. Measuring the red bird, it is almost 70 cm tall.
That leaves me wondering about the actual size of the plush toys.
