Question

a bird is flying at a true bearing of 75 degree's at a speed of 40 miles per hour. Write the velocity of the bird as a vector in component form.

Answer 1

Answer: V = (10.4 mph, 38.6 mph)

Explanation:

The velocity is written as (vx, vy)

where vx is the component of the velocity in the x-axis and vy is the component of the velocity in the y-axis.

In usual notation, the angles are measured counterclockwise from the positive x-axis.

We know that the angle is 75°, this means that the velocity in the x-axis will be equal to the total velocity of the bird projected in the x-axis (suppose a triangle rectangle, where the velocity is the hypotenuse, the x component is a cathetus and the y component is other cathetus)

vx = 40mph*cos(75°) = 10.4 mph

vy = 40mph*sin(75°) = 38.6mph

Then the vector of velocity is V = (10.4 mph, 38.6 mph)