Mission VP7 The Nature of a Projectile
Hold down the T key for 3 seconds to activate the audio accessibility mode, at which point you can click the K key to pause and resume audio. Useful for the Check Your Understanding and See Answers.
At any given moment during the trajectory of a projectile, it could be experiencing a component of FORCE which is directed ____.
A projectile is an object for which the only force acting upon it is gravity. The force of air resistance is negligibly small or nonexistent for a projectile.
A projectile can be moving upward or downward. And a projectile could be moving horizontally in addition to moving upward or downward. There may be a component of velocitydirected in any direction. But don't be fooled! All this describes the velocity of a projectile. If an object is a projectile, the only force is gravity and gravity is a downward force.
Like all questions in this mission, it is the definition of a projectile which must guide your thinking (see Dictionary section). If the only force acting upon a projectile is gravity; and if gravity is directed downward, then the answer to this question is ... (you can complete the logic).
