An astronaut comes loose while outside the spacecraft and finds himself floating

Question

An astronaut comes loose while outside the spacecraft and finds himself floating away from the spacecraft with only a big bag of tools. In desperation, the astronaut throws his bag of tools in the direction of his motion (away from the space station). The astronaut has a mass of 124 kg and the bag of tools has a mass of 16.0 kg. If the astronaut is moving away from the space station at 2.40 m/s initially, what is the minimum final speed of the bag of tools (with respect to the space station) that will keep the astronaut from drifting away forever?

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Explanation / Answer

using momentum conservation,

(124 + 16) x 2.40 = 16 x v + 124 x 0

v = 21 m/s

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