consider a falling body. human body.

let it be given the body falls for 7.0×10¹s. approximate the acceleration due to gravity (at g = 9.8 m/s²) to ignore air resistance until reaching terminal velocity of 195 km/h, or equivalently 54.16_m/s. from v = gt, we have 5.52 s of freefall in this manner. from d=(gt²)/2 this yields d = 149.7 m.

we have 64.48 s left. from d = vt, where v is terminal velocity defined above, d = 3492.6_. this gives us a total distance fallen in 70 seconds of 3642 m, or (for the non-metrically minded) 2.263 miles. we report two significant digits.

so gandalf fell 2.3 miles.


this is what i get for working in a place where the jokes involve redundant light bulbs and hot-swappable trash cans. i get freaking awesome, that's what i get.