A steel blade placed gently on the surface of water floats on it. If the same blade is kept well inside the water, it sinks. Explain.

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Solution

It floats because of the surface tension of water. The surface of water behaves like a stretched membrane. When a blade is placed on the water surface, it's unable to pierce the stretched membrane of water due to its low weight and remains floating.

However, if the blade is placed below the surface of water, it no longer experiences the surface tension and sinks to the bottom as the density of the blade is greater than that of water.

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