Acceleration of Missile

Problem:
Imagine a tank traveling with constant speed along the direction AB, and a missile is chasing the tank with constant speed . The direction of motion of the missile is always pointing towards the tank. At time t the tank is at position F and the missile is at position D, where FD is perpendicular to AB and FD=L. What is the acceleration of the missile at this instant?

There’s a lot of solutions to this problem. But I will provide the formal one (long method). This method requires knowledge skills on:

1. Differential Calculus
2. Vector Algebra
3. Distance-Velocity-Acceleration knowledge

Steps would include:

1. Writing initial conditions for missile and tank
2. Write the velocity of tank as magnitude*direction
3. Differentiate the velocity to get acceleration of missile
4. Substitute the initial conditions
5. Simplify
6. Answer should be

Try to solve the problem first without looking at the solution. If you’re still helpless, then here it is:

pset1-1 – acceleration of missile