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The apparent weight of a freely falling body is zero. Why?

Question

The apparent weight of a freely falling body is zero. Why?

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Solution

The apparent weight of a freely falling body is zero due to the following reasons:

  1. When a body is in free fall, it is falling under the sole influence of gravity. This means that the only force acting on the body is the gravitational force.

  2. The weight of an object is the force exerted on it due to gravity. In everyday situations, this force is counteracted by the normal force exerted by the surface the object is on. This normal force is what we perceive as weight.

  3. However, when an object is in free fall, there is no surface to exert a normal force. Therefore, the object does not experience a force counteracting gravity.

  4. As a result, the object does not "feel" its own weight. This is why we say that the apparent weight of a freely falling body is zero.

  5. It's important to note that the actual weight of the body (its mass times the acceleration due to gravity) is not zero. It's just that the body does not experience this weight while in free fall.

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