Piercing balls sitting on a table by a vertical line (Q1568787)

Let \({\mathcal F}_n\) be a family of disjoint balls all sitting on a fixed horizontal table \(T\). A table \(T\) is a region in the \(xy\)-plane in \({\mathbb R}^3\) bounded by a simple closed curve. A ball \(B\) is sitting on \(T\) if \(B\) is contained in the upper half-space \(z\geq 0\) and \(B\) is tangent to the \(xy\)-plane at a point in \(T\). Let \(l\) denote a vertical line that meets \(T\). The authors prove that if \(l\) meets \(2k+1\) balls in \({\mathcal F}_n\), then the radius of the smallest ball among the \(2k+1\) is at most \((2-\sqrt 3)^k\) times the radius of the biggest ball among the \(2k+1\) balls. Furthermore, using this result the authors prove that for any \({\mathcal F}_n\) the average number of balls \(l\) meets is at most \(\log n+o(1)\). A similar result for a two-dimensional version is also given together with a lower bound and an upper bound.