Question

An astronaut in orbit outside an orbiting space station throws her 800.0-g camera away because it jams. if she and her space suit together have a mass of 100.0 kg and the speed of the camera is 12.0 m/s,

A. what will be the speed of the astronaut after throwing the camera?

B. How far away from the space station will she be in 5 minutes?
c. a 5.0-kg lump of clay that is moving at 10.0 m/s to the left strikes a 6.0-kg lump of clay moving at 12.0 m/s to the right. the two lumps stick together after they collide. Find the final speed of the lump clay.

Answer 1

you can use conservation of linear momentum to find speed of astronaut.

Pin=Pfin (of course momentum is a vector quantity)

Answer 2

How?

Answer 3

The initial linear momentum is zero at space reference frame. Therefore the final linear momentum has to be zero. So

Pin=0

Pfin=(mass of the camera)*(velocity of the camera) + (mass of the astronaut)*(velocity of the astronaut)

then Pin=Pfin so you can find from here what velocity is.