A car traveling 85 km/h strikes a tree. The front end of the car compresses and the driver comes to rest after traveling 0.80 m. What was the average acceleration of the driver during the collision?

Question

17833 views around the world

You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License

Answer 1 · 2018-02-16T15:53:42

The acceleration is $=-348.4ms^-2$

The initial velocity of the car (driver) is $u=85kmh^-1$

$u=85/3.6=23.61ms^-1$

The distance travelled by the driver is $s=0.80m$

The final velocity of the driver is $v=0ms^-1$

Apply the equation of motion,

$v^2=u^2+2as$

The acceleration is

$a=(v^2-u^2)/(2s)=(0-23.61^2)/(2*0.80)$

$=-348.4ms^-2$