Why is the weight of a freely falling body zero?

because the speed of a free falling object is constant and does not accelerate, therefore force is 0 and therefore weight is 0

Freely Falling Bodies

the weight is not zero, the object feels its weight zero. the feeling of weight rises due to the reaction force from a plane it is standing on. in this case there is nothing to provide the reaction force and air is hardly capable of it. so it feels WEIGHTLESS.

The net force on a free falling body is zero.

Its weight is not zero, but it has accelerated to the point where the force of air resistance upwards is equal to the force of weight downwards. So the overall force on the body is zero.

This happens because the force of air resistance is related to the speed the body is falling at. At first the weight is more than the force of air resistance, so the body speeds up and falls faster. But falling faster makes air resistance increase. So it still falls faster, but it's now accelerating slower. It falls faster and faster and air resistance keeps increasing, until the force of air resistance is equal to the force of its weight. Now it is said to be in freefall. It no longer increases in speed, so air resistance doesn't change anymore, so it remains in free fall, with zero net force acting on it, until something else happens, like it hitting the ground.

Two answers.

1. If 'weight' is the force of gravity on something, you are not weightless when you fall. Gravity is still acting and making you accelerate.

2. If 'weight' is the force between you and the floor you stand on, then if you and the floor are both in free fall, the force between you and the floor is zero. So you are weightless according to the definition.

The gravitational force acting on a mass is mg.

While standing on the ground, we are not pulled into the ground by this gravitational force.

It is because the ground exerts a normal force in the upward direction.

These two are equal and opposite and act on us.

We are at rest and not accelerated.

What we mean by weight is the normal force acting up ward.

Thus the true weight of a body is mg while when the object is at rest and is not accelerated.

In the case of a freely falling body the gravitational force is acting on it, whereas there is no up ward equal force.

The upward force other wise called apparent weight in this case is zero.

If we place a weighing scale beneath the object when it is freely falling, the object will not press the springs in the scale and the scale will read only zero. It is because both are falling with the same acceleration.

The reading of the scale [ the apparent weight] is zero.

That seems about right.

More formally, the weight of the object will be constant in any inertial reference frame (i.e. if any observer moving at constant velocity measures the weight, they will find it to be the same). In a non-inertial (i.e. accelerating) reference frame, the apparent weight will be different.

I don't think that is correct. It won't be falling if in the first place there is no gravity. Weight is the force of gravity exerted on the body. The force of gravity doesn't cease to exists no matter what the state of motion of a body. There are situations when a body seems weightless. The key word here is "seems". It didn't say no gravity.

teddy boy