Unbelievable simulation shows how fast the speed of light actually is
Topics: Technology, YouTube
Jess Hardiman
Featured Image Credit: YouTube/Airplane Mode
Topics: Technology, YouTube
An incredible simulation has shown just how fast the speed of light travels, offering up a chance for viewers to 'grasp the scale of the universe'.
Prepare to have your mind blown:
The speed of light is the speed at which light travels in a vacuum - widely accepted as 186,282.4 miles per second (299,792,458 meters per second).
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It's so fast, that the concept can be pretty difficult for mere mortals to wrap their heads around.
Thankfully, helpful YouTube channel Airplane Mode created a video to explain things in simpler terms.
"What would it look like to go around the Earth once at the speed of light?" a message said at the beginning of the video, which shows exactly what that would look like if you were to somehow manage to board a plane that traveled at light speed.
In the clip, originally shared last year, the camera scrolls over the Earth taking in various scenes as it asks viewers to try and estimate how fast the speed of light would look.
It then shows us what that looks like - and to be honest, it’s not even long enough to be classed as a ‘blink and you’ll miss it’ moment, because the whole thing is done and dusted in 0.13 seconds or - to put it another way - just eight frames.
So, something traveling at the speed of light in a vacuum around Earth would complete around 7.5 orbits per second at the Earth's surface. That's a pretty astonishing fact. But what's even more astounding is the commonly known fact that it takes light eight minutes to reach Earth from the Sun.
The clip has left viewers blown away, with one person commenting: “That’s crazy I looked up in the sky when you did it and I saw the little light beam! It was cool to see it was very quick!”
Another said: “This helps to grasp the scale of the universe. It’s truly astonishing.”
While a third wrote: “When you take this into consideration. It really is crazy to think it takes approx 8 minutes for the light from the sun to reach Earth. Space truly is uncomprehendingly massive.”
And, of course, because it’s YouTube where people can’t be serious for a single minute - another viewer joked: "As always, hats off to the camera man who managed to run around the earth in 0.13 seconds."