How would i solve this Physics problem?

Question

"An ocean liner leaves New York City and travels 28.0° north of east for 141 km. How far east and how far north has it gone? In other words, what are the magnitudes of the components of the ship's displacement vector in the following directions? Due east and Due West" Can you please explain it and how you got to the answer. thanks

Answer 1

east = 141 * Cos(28) = 124.5 km Due east displacement

north = 141 * Sin(28) = 66.2 km  Due north displacement

The ship has no Due West displacement.

Further help, as suggested by the person below me:

Without getting into vector analysis,

for east/west ("x") displacements use the cos function

for north/south ("y") displacements use the sin  function

You need a scientific calculator

In the equation above, * means times

cos(28 degrees)=0.88295

141 x 0.88295=124.5 km east If the cos function

had given a negative value, this would be west.

Hope this helps.

Answer 2

Well, actually, the due west component would be the negative of the due east component.

I tried answering this question myself.  Unfortunately, it got to be quite a few pages long - I wanted to explain each step.  What you really need is one of us with you and a piece of paper :)

Is the answer the previous person gave you sufficient?  Do you know where they got the equations they did?