more fiddling with ch 2 hw

[light-and-matter.git] / share / mechanics / hw / earth-stepwise-equator.tex

(a) Let $R$ be the radius of the Earth and $T$ the time (one day) that it takes for one rotation. Find the
speed at which a point on the equator moves due to the rotation of the earth.\answercheck\hwendpart
(b) Check the units of your equation using the method shown in example \ref{eg:checking-units}
on p.~\pageref{eg:checking-units}.\hwendpart
(c) Check that your answer to part a makes sense in the case where the Earth stops rotating completely,
so that $T$ is infinitely long.\hwendpart
(d) Nairobi, Kenya, is very close to the equator. Plugging in numbers to your answer from part a,
find Nairobi's speed in meters per second. See the table in
the back of the book for the relevant data. For comparison, the speed of sound
is about 340 m/s.\answercheck\hwendpart