Question

There is a river in front of you that flows due South at 3.0m/s. You launch a toy boat across the river with the front of the boat pointed due East. When you tested the boat on a still pond, the boat moved at 4.0m/s. Now as it moves to the opposite bank, it travels at some speed relative to you, sitting in your chair. What is this speed

Answer 1

5.0 m/s

Step-by-step explanation:

If the river moves towards the south at 3m/s and the both moves towards the east at 4.0m/s, the speed of the boat relative to me will be the resulting displacement of both velocities of the river and that of the boat. This can be gotten using pythagoras theorem.

Let Vr be the relative speed. According to the theorem;

`V_r^2 = V_s^2 + V_e^2\\\\V_r^2 = 3.0^2 + 4.0^2\\\\V_r^2 = 9+16\\\\V_r^2 = √(25)\\ \\V_r = 5.0m/s`

Hence this relative speed is 5.0 m/s