The World's Longest Science Experiment

It has happened!  A study in Dublin, Ireland that has lasted sixty-nine years has finally been able to capture the fall of a drop of pitch (asphalt) on camera.  I realize this does not seem like much of a feat, but realize that asphalt is so viscous that it takes around ten years for a single drop to form and fall.  The original experiment, started in 1927 in Australia, tried to capture the fall of the pitch back in 2000, but their webcam failed at just the wrong moment, and the drop was missed.  (They have since installed three separate webcams to watch the experiment in case one fails again)  For those interested, the video of the fall is below.

Science Experiments can be Strange

Many people ask of this experiment, "what is the point of this?"  Well, this is a classic way of determining viscosity of a fluid. Pitch just flows so slowly that it takes decades to collect the data.  This may seem more boring than watching grass grow, and in some ways it is, but this experiment does produce some interesting data.  For instance, we now know pitch is twenty billion times more viscous than water.  It is also interesting because it shows that pitch is a fluid, yet we drive on it every day.  I think that is fascinating.

Interestingly, the original eighty-six year experiment is very close to recording their own pitch drop.  There is a good chance that we will get two recordings of pitch dropping in the same year, impressive considering until last week it had never been done.  For those with nothing better to do, the live video of the Australia experiment is below.

Pitch dropping from a funnel.  It's as fun as watching grass grow.

Think that is fun?  Below is a time-lapse video of the pitch dropping from April 2012 to April 2013.  If you watch real close, you might actually see something happen.