A cargo spacecraft has been launched to rendezvous with the International Space Station. The cargo ship must attain the same speed as the Space Station but maintain a distance of ten yards. As they orbit together, an arm from the Space Station will reach out the the cargo ship. Which oe of the four graphs represents the speed of the two objects as the orbit Earth?

Question

A cargo spacecraft has been launched to rendezvous with the International Space Station. The cargo ship must attain the same speed as the Space Station but maintain a distance of ten yards. As they orbit together, an arm from the Space Station will reach out the the cargo ship. Which oe of the four graphs represents the speed of the two objects as the orbit Earth?
Responses
A	AA
B	BB
C	CC
D	D

GPT-4o mini · Answer

To determine which graph represents the speed of the cargo spacecraft and the International Space Station (ISS) as they orbit Earth, we should consider the relationship between their speeds.

Speed Consistency: Both the ISS and the cargo spacecraft need to attain and maintain the same orbital speed in order to stay in a stable formation. Since the spacecraft needs to stay at a distance of ten yards (which is relatively small on an orbital scale), its speed must match that of the ISS closely, making their speeds very similar.
Graph Characteristics: The correct graph would show two lines that are parallel and remain at the same value over time, indicating that both the ISS and the cargo spacecraft maintain a constant, identical speed as they orbit Earth.

Given this analysis, the graph that best represents the speeds of the cargo ship and the ISS would show two horizontal lines that overlap or run parallel with the same height.

If we must choose from the provided options (A, B, C, D), please refer back to your optional graphs and select the one that depicts two horizontal lines of the same speed. If you can provide more information about what each graph looks like, I can offer a more precise response.