CMSharp01@aol.com wrote:
> > The WW II airplane was found beneath, I think, more than two hundred feet
> > of ice. I would think the large surface area of the plane's wings would
> > have prevented it from exerting enough pressure on the ice to melt its
> > way down through the ice. Assuming that's true, then the ice accumulated
> > over the plane since it went down.
>
> I know that YEC argument also. Even with the wings, metal is still denser
> than ice, so the plane will sink. It was also probably in an area were there
> was quite a lot of snow. I bet that if you counted the layers where the plane
> was found, they would correspond to the time the plane has been there, but
> of course YEC won't mention that.
If the possibility of the plane melting its way through the ice or snow is
at issue, what would be important would not be just relative densities (as if the
issue were simply buoyancy) but whether or not the plane would exert sufficient
pressure to depress the freezing point enough to liquify the ice.
That would depend on the plane's mass distribution & the surrounding
temperatures. But doing the calculation is perhaps overkill since, as you note,
this YEC argument is one of desperation.
Shalom,
George
George L. Murphy
gmurphy@raex.com
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Jan 15 2001 - 07:29:37 EST