SOLUTION: A car travels to the east from City A to City B, it takes 2 hours, and the road mileage is 100 miles. The map shows that the cities are only 80 miles apart. What is the average vel

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Question 633862: A car travels to the east from City A to City B, it takes 2 hours, and the road mileage is 100 miles. The map shows that the cities are only 80 miles apart. What is the average velocity?
Found 2 solutions by richwmiller, Edwin McCravy:
Answer by richwmiller(17219)   (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
There is extra info that is meant to confuse you. The map distance is irrelevant.
The average is 50 mph. 100/2 =50
Answer by Edwin McCravy(20060)   (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
A car travels to the east from City A to City B, it takes 2 hours, and the road mileage is 100 miles. The map shows that the cities are only 80 miles apart. What is the average velocity?
There is a difference between SPEED and VELOCITY.

Speed is a SCALAR quantity. It has magnitude only.
Velocity is a VECTOR quantity. It has both magnitude and direction.

If you had been asked the average SPEED, the answer would have been 100/2 or 50
miles/hour.

However you were asked for the average VELOCITY, you must specify both a
magnitude and a direction.  So the average velocity has a magnitude of 80/2 =
40 mile/hour in the EAST direction.  IOW it's the same as if you could have
driven EAST as the crow flies at 40mph.

Edwin
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