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Isaac Physics - Relative Velocities

I was doing a relative velocity question about a police spaceship chasing another spaceship and I’m really not sure what I’m doing wrong.

I found the velocity of the police spaceship to be 2.63km/s and velocity of the spaceship to be 2.5km/s and was told the distance between them was 3000km. I was asked to find how long it would take for the police car to catch up.

What I did was find the velocity of the police spaceship relative to the spaceship (which is 0.13km/s) and did the distance/velocity to find the time, not sure why that’s not working.
Original post by awesome54326
I was doing a relative velocity question about a police spaceship chasing another spaceship and I’m really not sure what I’m doing wrong.

I found the velocity of the police spaceship to be 2.63km/s and velocity of the spaceship to be 2.5km/s and was told the distance between them was 3000km. I was asked to find how long it would take for the police car to catch up.

What I did was find the velocity of the police spaceship relative to the spaceship (which is 0.13km/s) and did the distance/velocity to find the time, not sure why that’s not working.

3000/0.13sec is nearly 6 and a half hours - which wouldn't be a very thrilling chase.

make sure you've checked your units and not missed out any important information about the spacecraft having to accelerate or having to move at an angle to each other.
Original post by Joinedup
3000/0.13sec is nearly 6 and a half hours - which wouldn't be a very thrilling chase.

make sure you've checked your units and not missed out any important information about the spacecraft having to accelerate or having to move at an angle to each other.

Yeah, I tried that (6.41 hours), it didn’t work. I’m kind of just hoping that they’ve made a mistake because they are just moving in a straight line relative to each other and all the information used to solve the question is given directly.

.B05DFCCC-78AF-4AFF-BEE4-2D9E938E7F12.jpeg

Even the hint video makes it seem like it should just be that simple.
(edited 4 years ago)

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