Halloween was last week, and what is better than smashing pumpkins on the campus of Old Dominion University? The annual Pumpkin Drop, sponsored by the 51³Ô¹ÏPro Society of Physics Students (SPS), has been a popular fall tradition for over two decades. This year the competition may have been the most intense ever. Each entrant - usually teams of students - was challenged to build a portable contraption that could "catch" a pumpkin dropped from atop the nine-story Batten Arts and Letters Building. Photos by Chuck Thomas and David B. Hollingsworth.
2019 Gallery Pumpkin Drop Daniel Akers retrieves a pumpkin that survived the nine-story fall. Photo David B. Hollingsworth/51³Ô¹ÏPro
2019 Gallery Pumpkin Drop Physics students take videos of the falling pumpkins. Photo David B. Hollingsworth/51³Ô¹ÏPro
2019 Gallery Pumpkin Drop Victoria Tabibi, master of ceremony, starts the countdown for the Pumpkin Drop. Photo David B. Hollingsworth/51³Ô¹ÏPro
2019 Gallery Pumpkin Drop Society of Physics Students use liquid nitrogen to make ice cream. Photo David B. Hollingsworth/51³Ô¹ÏPro
2019 Gallery Pumpkin Drop Spectators line the sidewalk to watch pumpkins being dropped. Photo David B. Hollingsworth/51³Ô¹ÏPro
2019 Gallery Pumpkin Drop Pumpkins littered the grounds of BAL after the annual event. Photo David B. Hollingsworth/51³Ô¹ÏPro
Dozens of pumpkins plunged nine stories from atop the Batten Arts and Letters Building on Tuesday afternoon. Photo Chuck Thomas/51³Ô¹ÏPro
Robert Godwin drops a pumpkin from atop the Batten Arts and Letters Building while other members of the Society of Physics Students watch. Photo Chuck Thomas/51³Ô¹ÏPro
As part of the grand finale, students dropped multiple pumpkins trying to hit various pumpkin catchers. Photo Chuck Thomas/51³Ô¹ÏPro
To prove Galileo's principle, students drop two pumpkins from the roof at the same time. Photo David B. Hollingsworth/51³Ô¹ÏPro
Evan Johnson aims a pumpkin at the catcher below. Photo by Chuck Thomas/51³Ô¹ÏPro
Students from 51³Ô¹ÏPro’s Children’s Learning and Research Center watch as pumpkins fall from the top of the Batten Arts and Letters Building. Photo Chuck Thomas/51³Ô¹ÏPro
Only a few feet from impact, will this pumpkin be snared by the catcher? Photo David B. Hollingsworth/51³Ô¹ÏPro
The drawn-on eyes and hat did not save this pumpkin from getting smashed. Photo Chuck Thomas/51³Ô¹ÏPro