Question

A body travels 5 km due north and 5 km due south. The distance and displacement traversed are ____ and ____

Answer 1

First of all , let's define the terms distance and displacement.

Displacement is the total path length travelled by an object. Its scalar quantity having only magnitude and no direction. It is always positive.

Displacement is the shortest length between the starting and the stopping point. It is a vector having both magnitude as well as direction. It can be negative, zero or positive.

As per the question, the object travelled 5 km towards north and then travels 5 km towards south.

So distance will be :

$distance = 5 + 5 = 10 \: km$

But , displacement will be :

$displacement = 5 - 5 = 0 \: km$

Displacement became zero because the starting and the stopping point for that object became same.

Answer 2

$\huge \textsf{Answer}$

➤ A body travels 5 km due north and 5 km due south. The distance travelled by the body is 10 Km and the displacement is 0.

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This is because:-

$\huge {\underline{ \underline {\red{ \sf{}Distance}}}}$

✭ Distance is defined as the measure of the total path covered by the body.

✭ And distance of a moving body can never be zero because when a body moves from one place to another then it obviously would have covered some length.

✭ It is a scalar quantity.

✭ It can be a straight line a Zig Zag one or of any shape.

$\huge {\underline{ \underline {\green{ \sf{}Displacement}}}}$

✭ Displacement is defined as the shortest distance between 2 points.

✭ And displacement can be zero because when. a body starts at a point and then comes back to same starting point then obviously their shortest path would be 0.

✭ It is a vector quantity.

✭ It mostly is a straight line( in the case of earth it is a curve as the earth is a sphere, but we actually don't go from the north to the south hemisphere usually).

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