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Correct answer: 5
- Set up the geometry
Since the stationary man is at height above the horizontal line and is equidistant from the two moving men when they are apart, he must lie vertically above the midpoint of the segment joining them.
So each moving man is horizontally from the point directly below the stationary man.
Hence the distance from each whistle to the stationary observer is
- Find the radial velocity component for each man
For Doppler effect, only the component of source velocity along the line joining source and observer matters.
The cosine of the angle between the horizontal direction of motion and the line joining source to observer is
- The man in front moves at .
- The man behind moves at .
Since both men are walking in the same direction, and the observer is above the midpoint:
- the front man is moving away from the observer along the line of sight,
- the rear man is moving towards the observer along the line of sight.
Therefore radial components are:
(away), and
(towards).
- Observed frequencies from the two whistles
For a moving source and stationary observer:
- if source approaches,
- if source recedes,
where .
So,
- For the front man (receding):
- For the rear man (approaching):
- Compute the beat frequency
Beat frequency is
Now,
so
Also,
so
Thus
Now,
Hence
This gives approximately
- Final answer
The frequency of beats heard is
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