A 60 kg ice skater holds up a large sheet of cardboard that can catch the wind and drive her (frictionlessly) across the ice. While she's moving at 0.5 m/s, a wind that is constant and horizontal for 5.0 s exerts a force on the cardboard of 1.7 N. What is the skater's initial acceleration once the wind begins to blow?

See "related questions" below, and learn Newton's Second Law, F = ma.

.05 m/s2

To find the skater's initial acceleration once the wind begins to blow, we can use Newton's second law of motion, which states that the net force acting on an object is equal to the mass of the object multiplied by its acceleration.

In this case, we are given the mass of the skater (60 kg) and the force exerted by the wind on the cardboard (1.7 N). We want to find the skater's initial acceleration.

We can use the formula:

net force = mass x acceleration

Rearranging the formula to solve for acceleration, we have:

acceleration = net force / mass

Plugging in the values given:

acceleration = 1.7 N / 60 kg

Calculating the result:

acceleration = 0.02833 m/s²

Therefore, the skater's initial acceleration once the wind begins to blow is approximately 0.02833 m/s².