Xkcd webcomic writer and science communicator Randall Munroe has publish two books on what he shout out " absurd hypothetical head " . Among the unusual question explored in his firstWhat If?book wasthis : “ From what meridian would you need to dribble a steak for it to be cooked when it hit the ground ? ” . Munroe give a pretty comprehensive solvent but also point out that a lab experiment would be needed to check his “ wild guessing . ” Well , now that experiment has been done – and there is footage .

The question by Alex Lahey is ground on the fact an object moving at high speed through the atmosphere will see tremendous heating due to air compression on the leading bound . So would it be possible to falsify a steak that way ? Well , not really . Despite the high heat , it is a terrible way to cook one .

An exemplar of why is what happens often when meteorite get to Earth . Their outer layers are heated up and burned off , so what actually connect with the ground is cold . The same thing hap with the steak . Munroe hypothesized that the forbidden layer would get seared and be rive off at high speed . For a steak mooing at Mach 5 – five time the speed of sound – the compression will parch it and squelch it , but the inside will stay raw .

“ For the interest of this computer simulation , I assume that at lower speed some character of whirlpool shedding creates a flipping tumble , while at hypersonic velocity it ’s splash into a semi - stable ellipsoid of revolution shape . However , this is little more than a barbarian guess . If anyone order a steak in a hypersonic wind tunnel to get good data point on this , please , send me the video , ” Munroe wrote inthe reply .

Turns out , somebody did just that . Tom Fisher and Thomas Rees were researching hypersonic estrus transference at the University of Manchester , UK , and decided to bear the experiment . They used a “ 21 - twenty-four hours mature beef steak ” from British supermarket chain Sainsbury and placed it in a fart burrow at Mach 5 .

Munroe ’s idea of the squishiness was not too far off and it can be understandably project in the Schlieren envision evidence the hypersonic winds . The caloric cameras show how the exterior of the steak is indeed scorch and swash off , while the interior rest cold .

It is always respectable when the experiments mate the theories .