- #1
m00npirate
- 50
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Homework Statement
A ship is moving at 0.45c with respect to earth, and a beacon is fired perpendicular to the ship at 0.65c with respect to the ship. Find the velocity of the beacon with respect to earth.
Homework Equations
The Attempt at a Solution
My main problem here is seeing which numbers go where in the equations. My book basically just shows them, then has an example of adding velocities in one dimension >_>.
From what I gather, ux and uy are the components of the velocity of the beacon with respect to earth. u'x and u'y are the components of the velocity in the ship's frame, making u'x = 0 and u'y = 0.65c
This however makes the v's in the denominator cancel out, and I get ux = v and uy = 0.65[tex]\sqrt{1/ (v^{2}/c^{2}})[/tex]
Plugging in my value of ux for v I get uy = 0.65[tex]\sqrt{1/ (u_{x}^{2}/c^{2}})[/tex] which doesn't lead me anywhere.
Its pretty clear that I'm doing something wrong, I just ned a nudge in the right direction. Here's my picture of the problem (not to scale =P)
http://www.geocities.com/zombierobopirate/relativity.png
Thanks in advance