Question

an airplane has a maximum velocity of 160km/h in still air. calculate its maximum velocity when it travels in air with a crosswind of 30km/h

Answer 1

Velocity can be directly added or subtracted.

For example, if a boat has a velocity V in still water.

And now you put the boat in a river with a current that has a velocity V'

The total velocity of the boat in that river is just the addition of these two velocities.

Velocity in the river = V + V'

Where the only tricky part is that the velocity is a vector, so you need to take in account the directions of each vector.

In this case, we have a plane with a maximum velocity of 160km, let's assume a direction for this velocity, let's say that is in the positive x-direction.

Then we can write the velocity in the vector form:

velocity = (vel in x-axis, vel in y-axis)

The velocity of the plane can be written as:

v = (160km/h, 0)

Now we add a crosswind of 30km/h

crosswind means that it is perpendicular, then it acts on the y-axis.

Then the total velocity of the plane will be:

velocity = (160km/h, 0) + (0, 30km/h)

velocity = (160km/h, 30km/h)

Now you can compute the total velocity of the airplane as the module of that vector.

Remember that for a vector (x, y) the module is:

mod = √(x^2 + y^2)

Then the module of the velocity is:

v = √( (160km/h)^2 + (30km/h)^2) = 162.8 km/h