You have a boat with a motor that propels it at vboat = 4.5 m/s relative to the water. You point it directly across the river and find that when you reach the other side, you have traveled a total distance of 27 m (indicated by the dotted line in the diagram) and wound up 11 m downstream. What is the speed of the current?
.
2006-11-19 16:30:00 · 2 answers · asked by xiuhcoatl 1 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Physics
The boats path as viewed from an observer on the bank will be a the hypotenuse of a right triange. It moves along that hypotenuse at a speed of 4.5 m/s and has traveled 27 m on that path. therefore the time it took to get across was 27/4.5 seconds. In that time, it travelled downstream 11m. The river current is what was carrying it downstream and moved the boat 11m in 27/4.5 second. Velocity is distance/time so the river current is 11 / (27/4.5) m/sec
2006-11-19 17:00:55 · answer #1 · answered by gp4rts 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Solve the right triangle using Pythagoras, and then you can compute everything from the sizes and the boat speed.
2006-11-19 16:40:00 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋