An airplane is flying at 80 kilometers per hour when a strong tail wind, traveling in the same direction at 5 kilometers per hour, hits the airplane. How can the net force acting on the airplane be calculated?
a
add the forces
b
divide the forces
c
multiply the forces
d
subtract the forces
The net force acting on the airplane cannot be determined from the information given (speed of the airplane and the wind speed). Speed is a scalar quantity, which tells us how fast an object is moving, but it does not specify the forces acting on the object.
Forces are vector quantities and include both magnitude and direction. To find the net force on an object, you would typically add the vector forces acting on the object, taking into account their magnitudes and directions. If the forces are in the same direction, they would add together to give a larger net force. If they are in opposite directions, one would subtract the smaller force from the larger force to find the net force.
In the case of an airplane experiencing a tail wind, the force of the wind would contribute to the forward thrust of the airplane, effectively reducing the amount of thrust the engines need to provide to maintain the same airspeed or allowing the airplane to increase speed. However, without the actual forces (in newtons or another unit of force) acting on the airplane due to the engine thrust and the wind, we cannot calculate the net force.
Therefore, given the options provided:
a) add the forces
b) divide the forces
c) multiply the forces
d) subtract the forces
The correct answer would be (a) add the forces since you would combine the force of the wind acting in the direction of the airplane's motion with the thrust force of the airplane's engines. However, this is contingent on having the forces expressed as vectors with their respective magnitudes and directions. If you only have the speeds, you cannot directly calculate forces without additional information such as mass, drag, and engine thrust.