Answer to Question #51096 in Physics for hardeep chopra

When meteors enter the atmosphere, they are typically traveling at around 15km/s. At such

speeds, heat does not have time to be conducted away and even the air has no time to be pushed out of the way. This results in adiabatic compression of the air ahead of the meteor. The density of the atmosphere in kg/m3 is given by

rho=1.22e^(h/8100)

where h is the altitude in meters.

a) For a spherical meteor of radius 5m entering the atmosphere on a vertical trajectory, As a result of compressing all the air in its way into a cylinder of radius 5.5m and height 0.3m, there

will be a very high pressure and temperature in front of the meteor. Calculate the density of air in this compression zone when the meteor has reached an altitude of 4050m by finding the kg of air compressed and the volume of the compression zone. Hint: dm = ?Adh

b) Calculate the original volume of the gas before it was compressed. You may use h=40,000m as the top of the atmosphere.