If air waves and water waves are same.. why can’t ship not go fast like an airplane?. Is there a design fault?
Posted by James on February 6, 2012 · 3 Comments
Question by KLR: If air waves and water waves are same.. why can’t ship not go fast like an airplane?. Is there a design fault?
If air waves and water waves are same, why can’t ship not go fast like an airplane? Is there a design fault that makes the ship to sink or make scary during heavy storms?
Best answer:
Answer by ANF
Water has more friction than air.
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
Airplanes fly in air which is compressible. Ships sail in water, which is not compressible.
Because of its compresibillity, air can be pushed out of the way of the airplane simply by increasing pressure around the plane…. a boat can’t compress the water around it, and so must just move it.
With enough power, a ship could reach airplane speeds… but it would require so much more power, due to the incompressibility of water, that the weight of the boat (due to it’s engine) essentially becomes untenable.
ever been in a pool/ beach and pushed your hand through the water? its a lot harder than air
-while both are fluids, gases are not as thick, so there is less to push through; this reduced friction means that if a boat and a plane used the exact same power and were the exact same size, the airplane would go faster
-the problem is in the physics of the world, and the designs are different to make the best of it examples: planes use a lot of fuel to fight gravity and go fast (which costs a lot); but ships are easy to make, and use less fuel making them cheaper for moving lots of cargo
-about sinking ships, first you should look up how they float first, try googling “buoyancy cargo ships” to get started, and it sinks when that process goes wrong
Your assumption is wrong – air and water waves are not the same .. anyway, the problem is largely to do with the difference in the viscosity of water compared to air.