Question

a child is standing a distance 109 from the base of a large cliff. the student claps her hands and hears the sound of the clap echo off the cliff and return to her ears a time 0.635 s later. she then calculates the speed of sound. what value does she determine for the speed of sound? give your answer in m/s. do not include units in your answer. your answer:

Answer 1

The speed of sound calculated by the student, based on the distance of 109 meters from a cliff and the echo return time of 0.635 seconds, is approximately 343.31 m/s.

Step-by-step explanation:

To determine the speed of sound, we need to consider that the sound has to travel to the cliff and back, which means the total distance traveled by the sound wave is twice the distance from the child to the base of the cliff. Given that the child is standing a distance of 109 meters from the base of a large cliff and that the echo is heard after 0.635 seconds, we can use the formula:

Speed of Sound = Total Distance / Total Time

In this case, the total distance is twice the distance to the cliff:

Total Distance = 2 * 109 m = 218 m

Using the time it took for the sound to return, we calculate the speed:

Speed of Sound = 218 m / 0.635 s ≈ 343.31 m/s