A 1.5 m tall woman throws a tennis ball horizontally. The ball lands 20 m away. What was the initial horizontal velocity of the ball?
1 Answer
In projectile motion, we can treat the horizontal and vertical directions separately. Doing so in this case leads to the answer
Explanation:
Let's summarise what we know, and what we want to know:
Initial horizontal velocity:
Final horizontal velocity,
Initial vertical velocity:
Final vertical velocity,
Time:
Horizontal distance:
Vertical distance:
Vertical acceleration:
First step is to calculate the time taken for an object to fall
Since
Second step is to realise that the horizontal velocity is unchanged, and that the ball covered