Question

Describe the initial horizontal and vertical velocity of a horizontally launched projectile on Earth, as well as what happens to each velocity as the object moves along its trajectory, and why.

Answer 1

Answer:

Explained below

Explanation:

To explain this, let's consider a tennis ball being launched from the top of a very high building.

Now, if the tennis ball is launched horizontally without any upward angle but with an initial velocity of 10 m/s. In this motion, If there is no gravity, the tennis ball would continue in motion at that same speed of 10 m/s in the horizontal direction. However, in reality, gravity causes the tennis ball to accelerate downwards at a rate of 9.8 m/s for every second. This implies that the vertical velocity component is changing at the rate of 9.8 m/s every second.

Thus, after 1 second, horizontal velocity component will remain 10 m/s and vertical component will be 9.8 m/s × 1 = 9.8 m/s downwards.

Also, after 2 seconds, the vertical velocity component will remain 10 m/s, however the vertical component will now be 9.8 × 2 = 19.6 m/s downwards.

Same procedure is repeated as t increases by 1 second.