A radio signal travels at
3.00⋅10^8
meters per second. How many seconds will it take for a radio signal to travel from a satellite to the surface of Earth if the satellite is orbiting at a height of
3.54⋅10^7 meters? Show your work.
We can use the formula:
time = distance / speed
In this case, the distance is the height of the satellite above the Earth's surface:
distance = 3.54⋅10^7 meters
The speed is the speed of light (which is essentially the same as the speed of a radio signal):
speed = 3.00⋅10^8 meters per second
Plugging in these values, we get:
time = 3.54⋅10^7 meters / 3.00⋅10^8 meters per second
Simplifying this fraction, we can cancel out a factor of 10^7:
time = 3.54 / 3 = 1.18 seconds
Therefore, it would take a radio signal 1.18 seconds to travel from the satellite to the surface of the Earth.