Air drag and Momentum?
What happens to the acceleration of an object as it falls? What would the acceleration be if there was no air drag?
What are the two factors that affect the air drag on an object? How would this affect the likelihood of keeping a fragile object intact?
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if no friction the acceleration is determined by gravity:
a = GM/R^
where M is the mass of Earth (if it falls on Earth) if it falls from
the height << R then a it can be considered constant equal to 9.8 m/s^2
If there is friction. It is known be proportional to object cross-section and
proportional to its speed (may be some power law).
This means that eventually friction force will equal gravitational pull and object will be falling with constant velocity.
Fragile object intact - I do not know. Friction causes the temperature to rise. If it rises too quickly object explodes (like meteor).
If friction is so high that the resulting speed is so slow, that the oject can survive when it hit the ground (compare falling ant and falling person, ant will survive fall from any height)