You have been hired as a technical consultant for an early-morning cartoon series for children to make
Question:
You have been hired as a technical consultant for an early-morning cartoon series for children to make sure that the science is correct. In the script, a wagon containing two boxes of gold (total mass of 150 kg) has been cut loose from the horses by an outlaw. The wagon starts from rest 50 meters up a hill with a 6o slope. The outlaw plans to have the wagon roll down the hill and across the level ground and then crash into a canyon
where his confederates wait. But in a tree 40 meters from the edge of the canyon wait the Lone Ranger (mass 80 kg) and Tonto (mass 70 kg). They drop vertically into the wagon as it passes beneath them. The script states that it takes the Lone Ranger and Tonto 5 seconds to grab the gold and jump out of the wagon, but do they have that much time available? You assume that the wagon rolls with negligible friction.