An astronaut with a mass of $110 kg$ is floating in space. If the astronaut throws an object with a mass of $4 kg$ at a speed of $7/9 m/s$ , how much will his speed change by?

Question

1630 views around the world

You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License

Answer 1 · 2015-12-28T17:02:59

I found $0.03m/s$ in the opposite direction with respect to the object

You may use Conservation of Linear Momentum $p=mv$ along the $x$ direction where you get:

$p_("before")=p_("after")$

$(110*0)+(4*0)=(110*v)+(4*7/9)$
rearranging:

$110v=-28/9$
$v=-28/(9*110)=-0.03m/s$ opposite to the object

An astronaut with a mass of 110 kg110 kg is floating in space. If the astronaut throws an object with a mass of 4 kg4 kg at a speed of 7/9 m/s7/9 m/s, how much will his speed change by?