So, to my knowledge, things burn up when entering the atmosphere due to the friction caused by all of the air molecules hitting them on the way down which would make sense when an object gets faster, it hits more air molecules, and heats up, however, when an object reaches terminal velocity it no longer goes any faster, and objects that aren’t aerodynamic have a relatively low terminal velocity, meaning it may go just as fast being dropped from a tall building, and obviously, things don’t burn up (or even get hot) when being dropped from a tall building. So my question is why exactly being something falling into the atmosphere will burn up, but not if it’s dropped at a much lower height that would still reach it’s terminal velocity.
In: Physics
Already got some excelent answers, but one point that might be worth clarifying is that terminal velocity is really medium-dependant. The resistance from the stuff you are falling *through* (air in this case) is what counters the acceleration due to gravity. This is why something falling from orbit can be going fast enough to burn up.
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