5. Tara goes on a camel safari in Africa. She travels 5 km north, then 3 km east and then 1
km north again. What distance did she cover? What was her displacement?
Tara covered a distance of 9 kilometers and her displacement was 6.7 kilometers towards north east.
Explanation:
To determine the distance traveled by Tara, we can add up the breakdown of the distances traveled by her on the camel.
Therefore, 5 km (north) + 3 km (east) + 1 km (north) = 9 km.
Now to determine the linear displacement of Tara, let us assume that the linear distance covered by Tara forms the hypotenuse of a right-angled obtuse-angled triangle. Therefore, by applying the Pythagoras theorem -
[(5+1) km displacement towards north]² + [3 km displacement towards east]² = 6.7 km displacement towards north east.
