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Haunted swing baffles scientists


Owlscrying

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O, I am watching the Youtube Argentinian version from their channel 5 news. The swingset was built last June. There is also a chapel in this park. Supposedly the neighbors of this park have seen this phenomenon for a long time, but now people come from all over to see it. The phenomenon happens whether there is wind or not, (according to the old lady.) She also says that now that there are so many people there, the swing won't move, at least in the daytime. Some people think it is the ghost of a child that was killed in a car accident just a few meters from the park. Also, scientists are going to do studies of the swingset to see if there is something going on with magnetism, to find a logical reasoning for the swing. The family of the dead child is also upset by the allegations that it is the spirit of the child. (The family lives close by the park.)

canal 5

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Taken from a forum of physicists discussing possible reasons.

Here's the thing, the swing is basically two pendulums connected together. If you know how a pendulum works then you know that the longer a pendulum is the more time it takes to swing back and forth. You can't tell from looking at the videos, but one of the chains on that swing must be slightly longer than the other one, and the result is that the swing twists at the end of each swing because the shorter chain tries to swing back before the longer chain does. Each twist turns the seat to an angle to the wind and then it catches the wind like a sail. The other swings on the set all have chains of equal length so they don't twist and hence don't catch the wind.

I used to work in an office with air conditioning vents on window sills and vertical strip blinds on the windows. The strip were freely pivoted at the top, and the strips were connected by a loose chain to open and close them so they could rotate fairly independently. At the bottom they were connected by a loose metal chain which notionally provided enough weight to stop them being blown around by the draft from the aircon. There were a few windows where a similar effect to the swings happened. A few strips of blind went into a finite amplitude oscillation cycle that was pretty much impossible to stop, while the rest of the blinds just moved around a bit at random. But since one of the things we did was worry about aerodynamic instability of various bits of jet engines, nobody in the office found this at all surprising.

If all the swings wanted to blow around, a couple of 10 lb weights on the seats of the other two swings would stop them, and woudn't show in video #1 (I didn't watch the other two videos).

Physics Forums

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  • 3 months later...
Oh my GOD i don't believe i'm doing this... ok everyone gather around... this is what is called looking at the EVIDENCE!!

First of all the most logical solution to this would be WIND. The shape of the seat is more than capable of catching the wind, then as it reaches the apex of the swing, it twists and the wind propels it a little the other way. Each increase in swing is a little more than the last. Considering it is a gradual and cumulative effect this ALSO lends credit to the wind theory as the swing would slowly gain more momentum as it was propelled little by little.

Think of the shape of the seat... if the seat twists slightly, the wind is caught by the leading edge and is funneled to the other side. Lika so....

linked-image

As the wind doesn't have enough power to keep propelling the seat, so the leading edge reaches it's apex & starts traveling the other direction.. followed by the trailing edge. Now the seat is catching the wind with the same side, but twisted the other way.. again catching the wind, and funneling it out the "back" (in relation to the direction it is now traveling. .. like so....

linked-image

The news reports said that the wind wasn't a factor in the swings movement. This is clearly false....

By watching the motion of the seat in the first video it is always "leading" its movement with the side closes to the camera. Therefore we can make the prediction that the wind is traveling towards the person filming across the axis of the seat.

Video 1 case study

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<a href="http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=-PHqCm0wNi4" target="_blank">http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=-PHqCm0wNi4</a>

1. At timing .55 a leaf can be seen to be blowing towards the camera person thus confirming that there is WIND and this wind is in the correct direction for the seat to catch it & propel it forward little by little in a cumulative manner.

2. At timing 1.46 a woman with red pants and long hair enters the frame, her hair is clearly being blow by the wind, again from the right direction.

3. At timing 1.49 a woman with a black parker and long hair ALSO has her hair blown

4. JN you mentioned that no-ones clothes were being moved by wind, this is due to everyone wearing heavy cold weather gear.

5. JN you also mentioned that you couldn't see any trees moving, this is because if they were moving the quality of the video is poor and shaking considerably. Over long distances the effects of a shaky view point is grossly exaggerated, even if the trees ARE moving, you cant see it because the camera is jumping all over the place.

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Video 2 case study

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<a href="http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=f1QpvBGnv2E" target="_blank">http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=f1QpvBGnv2E</a>

If the wind was a contributing factor then the swings would have to "lead" with the edge farthest from the wind. If we look at motion of the swings and land marks this means that the wind would have to come from the road in this video (co-incidentally the same direction as the other video)

1. Immediately it is audible that the wind is blowing

2. At timing .03 the second man from the right has his pants being blown by the wind... from behind him.. which is towards the road.

3. At timing .25 there is a couple standing, behind them is a shrub which can be seen being blown around by the wind.

4. At timing .25 there is also a man with a red shirt, his pants are being blown by the wind, the motion of his pants confirms that the wind is originating from his right.. this direction of the road.

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This type of critical thinking is what we need to address the "unexplained" NOT a wishy washy "oh the audio is bad, i'm not sure, it might be paranormal"

then why is only one swing moving?

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They would have ruled wind out, as that would possibly be the prime cause of the swing moving on it's own. To assume that they did not consider wind as a variable in the test would be arrogant. As it would be common sense to test if wind made the swings move. Are you a scientist? I think not - so why should your claims be thought of over a person experienced , and who has a physical degree showing their own personal knowledge and commitment to the Scientific field. But as Xeaphon stated, how come there is only one swing moving? If there was wind - would alright to safely believe that the other swings would move?

Edited by Drayno Helvey
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Photoshopped!

Okay, just kidding. Weird videos, but I don't see it as something all that peculiar. There have been many other posts on here explaining what it could be, so I won't repeat them all. But the video is interesting.

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i dont understand how anybody could think this is wind. the swing is clearly kicking. has anyone ever actually ridden a swing? it kicks at the "apex" that impostleable frequently refers to. but i think if anything that disproves his "infallible" theory. swings kick at the apex because youre pulling back and kicking your legs forward. somebody please remember their childhood. goodness.

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But as Xeaphon stated, how come there is only one swing moving? If there was wind - would alright to safely believe that the other swings would move?

We're talking about resonance, not the wind just pushing the swing up in one big go.

In physics, resonance is the tendency of a system to oscillate at maximum amplitude at certain frequencies, known as the system's resonance frequencies (or resonant frequencies). At these frequencies, even small periodic driving forces can produce large amplitude vibrations. Click

The other swings are moving to begin with, but the oscillations die down. That might be because they're a very slightly different length and so have different natural frequencies.

So you're pushing someone on a swing, say it takes two seconds for them to make one full swing. If you push them once every two seconds at the right moment they're going to start going higher and higher, because you're in sync, right? But now if you change the frequency at which you push them, you'll end up out of sync, and so when you push them you'll oppose their motion and they'll come to a stop.

The wind could be pushing that one swing at the right frequency so that the amplitude of oscillation increases and it keeps getting higher and higher, while the other swings operate at a different frequency, so the wind is opposing their motion.

i dont understand how anybody could think this is wind. the swing is clearly kicking. has anyone ever actually ridden a swing? it kicks at the "apex" that impostleable frequently refers to. but i think if anything that disproves his "infallible" theory. swings kick at the apex because youre pulling back and kicking your legs forward. somebody please remember their childhood. goodness.

It's not kicking any more than any other empty swing changing direction should do.

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That's an interesting video. . . I think someone would have noticed if someone had a string attached to it or something. . . There are plenty of swings that are different lengths that don't do what that one does. . .and the fact that it is slightly predictable raises questions too. . .I wonder if they ever got the "ghost hunters" there. lol.

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