For those who want to learn how the cannon works and why a ball that is near weightless can become so powerful, here is the full video. French explains that air drag works against an object like a ping pong ball, but he works around that by creating a vacuum for the ball to accelerate through.
That's all well and good, but we need to see this cannon destroy more stuff. As the good professor implores others not to try this at home, I now plead with him to make like Gallagher and begin a series of ping-pong annihilation. The report offers this for those wondering if a ping pong ball could be used as a weapon. I do not have the muscle power that they possess. My attempt at shooting it out? Well, OK then this is embarrassing.
Guess I will just fish it out with my fingers. You know what happens to a wet, slippery ping pong ball that weighs absolutely nothing? It spins. It is impossible to grab a-hold of. It had no string. It had no weight. Thoughts of a visit to the emergency room to explain that I needed a ping pong ball removed from my vagina sent me into a panic attack. A massive panic attack.
My heart was racing, I started to cry. He hustled me into the house, told me to lie on the bed, retrieved a flash light. And within 15 seconds had that sucker out.
I have never been so relieved in my entire life. But then……I went to work the next day. What happened then? Cue Panic Attack Number Two. I quickly re-read what I had written. Measuring the speed with a ballistic chronograph, I recorded velocities greater than miles per hour.
So could a great table-tennis player actually return a serve at this speed? I recruited a volunteer and pressurized the cannon—check out the video at the end to see what happened. There are more ways to tweak and customize Chrome than you might have realized.
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