Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1916-01-01
nv GARRETT p. sERvIss.


Among the wonders of our solar 'sys-
tenn / wish you would point out the ire
Inendous velocity of our earth and moon
travelling through space. comparing II
with the speed of the rifle ball, etc. etc'
NothinL. in the universe is more impress
siVe 10 me than the speed and power OF
those vast protectons.-H. L. D. brlNtoh'
The direction and speed Of the esrth's
flight are the rssultants OF two motions
with which it is endowed-the one around
the sun, the other with the sun straight
NHway through space. The combination OF
these simultaneous motions causes the
earth to travel in spiral path whose
axis is directed nearly toward the bright
star Vega, or Alpha Lyrae, the most
beautiful in the northern sky.
9 In it's orbit. or annual path around the
isun, the earth's mean speed 10 eighteen
And one-hslt miles per second while its
speed OF translation toward Vega which
ii shares with the sun, Is about twelve
miles per second. We may call the re-
sultapt, or combined, speed of the earth
in it's actual spiral Trajectory twenty-five
miles per second.
This means that IL you could stand be-
side It and see the earth rush by its
whole enormous globe, 5000 miles in diam
eter, would pass your eye in about six
minutes. II means that in one day and
right (twenty-four hours) the earth trav-
els 1900, 500 miles!
Compared with the velocity of projec-
tiles the speed OF the earth's flight is so
great that the swiftest Of them would
seem to stand still A rifle bullet may
go. say, one-third OF mile per second.
in the first moments of its flight-that
is. sixty times slower than the EARTH
which never stops or slows up.
The initial velocity OF some projectiles
may be half a mile per second, or forty
SlfouF times slower than the earth. II a
cannon could be planted out in space and
fired at the earth from a distance equal
to one-quarter of the esrths diameter
(which would be like a hunter firing his
rifle about eighteen inches from a deer's
slde). and II the shot were aimed at the
front edge OF the flying earth Imagining
the latter flat like a disk, and fired with
an undiminishing velocity OF half a mile
per second 1t would not only miss its
mark, but the whole breadth OF the earth
would have passed by before the ball had
traversed one-tenth of the original dis
lance separating the cannon from the
earth. To recur to the comparison OF the
hunter and the deer, it would be as II
the animal ran so fast that It got out OF
the line OF fire before the bullet had trav-
eled two inches from the gun
The motion OF the earth becomes pos
sibly even more impressive when we con-
slider the awful energy Il produces.
Kinetic energy. or the capacity TO do
work, such as striking a blow, is meas
ured by multiplying the mass OF the
moving body by the square of its We
Ioeity and dividing the product by two.
In order 10 get the result in foot
pounds We reckon the mass in pounds
and divide again by thirty-two, or by
sixty-four in all. sThe reason for divid-
= ing by thiTty-two more exactly S2.l0 Is
that that number is the unit On feet per
secondJ of the earths sravitation. or
the acSeieration OF gravity.
Calculated in this way the kinetic
energy OF the earth comes out at more
than ninety septillion go followed by 2
Esros) foot-pounds. Figured in another