Question

Suppose you are on a conveyor belt walkway at an airport. The walkway is moving at 0.50 m/s. You walk backward at 0.80 m/s to hand your suitcase to a friend who is 3.0 m behind you. A security guard stands alongside the walkway watching this. What is your speed relative to the guard?

a. 0.50 m/s
b. 1.30 m/s
c. 0.30 m/s
d. 0.80 m/s

Answer 1

Your speed is (0.5 m/s forward) + (0.8 m/s backward)

= (0.3 m/s backward) , according to witnesses
who are not on the walkway.

It doesn't matter where you're headed, or why.