Thread: Help with this "story" question

The Starship USS Enterprise is travelling in a straight flight path through the Delta Quadrant when its sensors detect a disturbance in the fabric of the space-time continuum. The Captain orders Data to reverse course. However, as Data does this, the effect of the disturbance overtakes Enterprise.
Instantaneously, the crew and ship find themselves flying towards the point at which they detected this disturbance but from the opposite direction. Once again Captain Picard orders Data to reverse course and explain what has happened.

Data discovers that they have experienced a displacement phenomenon modelled by the mathematical function: s(t)= 3t+ 10/(t-5) +2

s is the displacement in 1000s of km from the moment the disturbance was detected and t is the elapsed time in minutes. The ship is now back on course but displaced in parallel by 2000km.

(a)As Data reverses course the first time, Enterprise continues its forward motion for some minutes then returns the way it came. After how many minutes, correct to three significant figures, does Enterprise return to the point at which its sensors first detected the disturbance?

(b)After how many minutes does the effect of the disturbance overtake Enterprise?

(c) Data reverses course twice. Exactly when does Enterprise actually turn each time? Give your answers correct to three decimal places.

(d)What is the expression for the final course on which Enterprise is travelling?

(e)Data said, “We are back on course but displaced in parallel by 2000km”. What was the original course and why does he say it is displaced by 2000km?

(f) Captain Picard asks Data to display their displacement time graph on a monitor. Sketch what he would see for 0 ≤ t ≤ 10 and 0 ≤ s ≤ 34


How do i do this? Im so confused. Thanks to anyone who can help

Originally Posted by charlesb

The Starship USS Enterprise is travelling in a straight flight path through the Delta Quadrant when its sensors detect a disturbance in the fabric of the space-time continuum. The Captain orders Data to reverse course. However, as Data does this, the effect of the disturbance overtakes Enterprise.
Instantaneously, the crew and ship find themselves flying towards the point at which they detected this disturbance but from the opposite direction. Once again Captain Picard orders Data to reverse course and explain what has happened.

Data discovers that they have experienced a displacement phenomenon modelled by the mathematical function: s(t)= 3t+ 10/(t-5) +2

s is the displacement in 1000s of km from the moment the disturbance was detected and t is the elapsed time in minutes.

This doesn't quite make sense. I presume you mean "s is the displacement in 1000s of km from the position the moment the disturbance was detected"
but "t is the elapsed time in minutes": what elapsed time? I presume starting at the moment the the disturbance was detected but ending when? The displace, we are told, was "instantaneous".

The ship is now back on course but displaced in parallel by 2000km.

(a)As Data reverses course the first time, Enterprise continues its forward motion for some minutes then returns the way it came. After how many minutes, correct to three significant figures, does Enterprise return to the point at which its sensors first detected the disturbance?

(b)After how many minutes does the effect of the disturbance overtake Enterprise?

(c) Data reverses course twice. Exactly when does Enterprise actually turn each time? Give your answers correct to three decimal places.

(d)What is the expression for the final course on which Enterprise is travelling?

(e)Data said, “We are back on course but displaced in parallel by 2000km”. What was the original course and why does he say it is displaced by 2000km?

(f) Captain Picard asks Data to display their displacement time graph on a monitor. Sketch what he would see for 0 ≤ t ≤ 10 and 0 ≤ s ≤ 34


How do i do this? Im so confused. Thanks to anyone who can help

That was just how the question was written.