In article ,
says...

On 2018-06-21 06:26, Jeff Findley wrote:

http://gassend.net/spaceelevator/breaks/index.html


Looked at "breaks at counter weight" (longest section of cable that
falls down with only counter weight going away)

Why would the falling cable become "loose" and snake ?

Because it's flexible, duh. Imagine that you took 10 meters of fishing
line with a weight at the bottom then cut it in the middle. Would it
stay straight as it fell? Try it!

I majored in dynamics and control at Purdue. This stuff is *not*
intuitive, but it can be simulated and verified experimentally.

Since the top most portions, when being pulled down, would accelerate
more that portions below it, wouldn't the cable remain raughts and thus
no slack that allows snaking ?

Why would it break up in space as it falls?

To put it simply, it breaks when the stress at a point exceeds the
material strength. Again, the dynamics of the falling tether is not
intuitive. That's why we perform simulations like this.

Why did the Tacoma Narrows Bridge break up due to *wind*?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacoma...s_Bridge_(1940)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-zczJXSxnw

Again, this stuff isn't intuitive. The bridge designers, at the time,
simply didn't take into account the dynamics of the bridge in a strong
wind.

Jeff
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