- #1
gothloli
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Homework Statement
You are at the mall on the top step of a down escalator when you lean over laterally to see your 1.80 m tall physics professor on the bottom step of the adjacent up escalator. Unfortunately, the ice cream you hold in your hand falls out of its cone as you lean. The two escalators have identical angles of 40.0° with the horizontal, a vertical height of 10.0 m, and move at the same speed of 0.400 m/s. Will the ice cream land on your professor's head? Explain. If it does land on his head, at what time and at what vertical height does that happen? What is the relative speed of the ice cream with respect to the head at the time of impact?
Homework Equations
s = 1/2(u + v)t
and relative velocity
vectors
The Attempt at a Solution
I suppose that the vertical height as well as the horizontal distance is changing as the escalators go up and down. I'm confused as to whether I use relative velocity, since both escalators move at same velocity, but in opposite directions. I know that to find the time, you have to set their distance equations equal but they cancel, since velocity is the same. I attached file of the trig.