Skip to main content

My Snow Shelter

When I heard a blizzard was barreling along the country towards New England and the announcement was made that there would be no school on Thursday, it is safe to say that fort building was not in my future plans. After several trips outside on Thursday and Friday to shovel snow off the driveway, all of the stairs, all of the paths, and the back deck, I was not looking forward to spending more time outside in the biting cold to create an elaborate snow structure. Off and on over the weekend, I searched for a possible solution to my dilemma until I came across an image of a structure typically taught in the Boy Scouts, the mighty tree pit, which takes advantage of the lesser amount of snow below a evergreen tree due to the needles stopping the vast majority of the snow coming down.These same tree wells that are used to create a snow shelter that can save a life are also a major danger to skiers and snowboarders on glades as they can slide into these wells which can be quite deep and dislodge the snow from the tree above them trapping them upside down in the well. 


This type of structure also met my requirements of being quick to build with little effort while also fulfilling the requirements of the project. Upon this discovery, I set out with my shovel across the backyard into the woods. After a long and extensive search (which took ten minutes), I had found my tree, I did not have worry about low hanging branches, because as a kid I had snapped all the branches off the very bottom part of the tree. This saved me a lot of effort of having to clear these branches, although I did take some of the smaller boughs from another tree to provide myself a suitable floor for my structure once it was finished. The foliage of this tree was not thick enough to allow me to skip the step of adding extra evergreen boughs to form a wind break. Using a shovel under the tree was quite difficult but I eventually figured out how to make a level floor to put the boughs on allowing me to complete the structure in about 25 minutes of actual work consisting of shoveling out a small hole around the trunk of the tree, throwing a lot of the collected material on the lower branches to form a windbreak, and using the rest of the collected material for the floor. However, before this I had spent about a half hour collecting the boughs for the floor and for the windbreak. The structure was quite warm and even in the stiff wind outside I felt little breeze inside my structure. I would call this shelter a major success and I am glad I taught myself how to build this great survival structure.





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Physics of Spiderman

Over this past weekend after I finished working on my homework, I decided to relax and watch a few movies before going asleep. Among the movies I watched was Spider-Man 3 from 2007 and despite the movie flaws I was interested by the scenes that showed Spider Man shooting through the sky with the use of his webs that come out of his wrists. Due to this, I decided to make my blog post about the physics of Spider-Man's slingshot. After doing some research, I discovered just how much information there is on the physics of Spider-Man and how elements of Spider-Man can be used as examples for most topics learned in mechanics. For this investigation, I will not be using the horrible cliche and terrible CGI infested mess that Spider-Man 3 is but instead the all around superior Spider-Man movie of Spider-Man 2 to investigate the physics of Spider-Man's web propelled slingshot.  I want to talk about what happens in terms of physics when Spider-Man launches himself across a dista...
Post a Comment
Read more

Physics of Sound Dampeners and Active Noise Cancellation

Physics of Sound Dampeners and Active Noise Cancellation Sound dampening foam panels in a recording studio. ANC headphones worn by pilots and/or passengers in consumer aviation aircraft.  Acoustic treatment of soundscapes has grown alongside the sound production industry. Whether through absorption panels, diffusors and cloud panels to treat a space or headphones placed directly over the ears of listeners, acoustic treatment comes in many forms. Environments are treated acoustically to absorb excess sound to prevent sound levels from crossing a threshold above which the desired goal cannot be had. Before getting into sound dampening, we must discuss sound. Sound is produced when an object vibrates (a form of oscillation) and temporarily displaces nearby air molecules causing a wave effect as the displaced molecules collide with their neighboring molecules. Sound waves are fluctuations in pressure as the initial displacement of molecules experiences collisions that in ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Physics Behind Drone Flight

A drone flies by using its downward thrust and forcing air in a particular direction in order to sustain a certain speed as well as a specific height. In this video my friend and I had been flying a drone at exactly 4 mph which converts to 1.788 m/s. In this project, we will be determining the forces acting upon the drone in order to sustain a consistent flight in terms of velocity and height while excluding the effects of air resitance. The drone is flying at an angle of 28˚, this is found by extending the tilted axis of the drone to the horizontal and finding the angle with a protractor. From this angle we will be able to calculate the downward thrust and the acceleration of the drone that allows it to maintain its height and velocity during flight. When the mass of the drone is taken it results in 734 grams or .734 kilograms, which will also be used for the calculations within the project. The freebody diagram pictured above will alow us to derive the force equations f...
Post a Comment
Read more