A snake is slithering toward you at 1.5 m/s. If you start walking when it is 5.0 m away, how fast must you go in order that the snake not overtake you when you have gone 40.0 m?
Answers
Explanation:
This question makes very little sense. Have you ever heard of a snake moving 1.5 meters per second? No, those little boys (adorable, may I add) are fast. More like 3.5 meters per second. Venomous species can strike from around 2.5 meters, and kill you in seconds. Non-venomous species strike at around .5 meters, and prefer to flee. If you flee, the snake will likely run the opposite direction. If you stand still, the snake is likely to investigate and then flee.
Now, let’s said this snake is, I don’t know, the one in the Garden of Eden, and is intending to kill you. If you start anywhere nearer than 3.5 meters, you’re dead in a few seconds. Human recognition and response patterns aren’t fast enough to identify and flee a snake that intends to kill you at that close of a range. Provided you can walk the average - 3 to 5 kilometers per hour - which is about .8 meters per second, you would have to run. You need to obtain a terminal velocity of at least 3.6 meters per second to avoid the snake. In fact, you can maintain this 3.6 meters for hours and eventually get ahead of the snake. Really, any speed above 3.6 meters per second will get you away. Since you didn’t quantify a time period, I’ll leave it at that. Plus, if you’re 100 meters away from a snake, they aren’t going to recognize you, or even want to investigate. You’d only have to be around 10 meters for them to lose interest.