Near-Earth Orbit

Suppose Earth had no atmosphere and a ball was fired from the top of Mt. Everest in a direction tangent to the ground. If the initial speed was high enough to cause the ball to travel in a circular trajectory around Earth, the magnitude of the ball’s acceleration would...

A) be zero

B) be much less than g (because the ball doesn’t fall to the ground).

C) be approximately g.

D) depend on the ball’s speed.

Solution