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A student travels cross-country from her home to her family’s house which is in

ID: 1881289 • Letter: A

Question

A student travels cross-country from her home to her family’s house which
is in another state. First, she drives from her home to the airport going at a speed of
approximately 60 mph for half an hour. Then she immediately boards the plane which
takes 4.0 hours to travel 2,500 miles across the country. When she arrives at the airport,
she sits and waits for half an hour to get picked up by her family. Lastly, she travels for
half an hour at a speed of 40 mph from the airport to her family’s house. Determine the
average speed of her entire trip from her home to her arrival at her family’s house.

Explanation / Answer

Case 1:  

V1=60 mph ,t=0.5 hour

Distance between from her home to airport is

d1=Vt =60*0.5 =30 miles

Case 2:

d2=2500 mile and t=4 hours

Case 3:

d3=0 and t=0.5 hours

Case 4:

V=40 mph and t=0.5 hours

d4 =40*0.5 =20 miles

Average speed of her entire trip from her home to her arrival at her family’s house is

Vavg =total distance /total time

Vavg =(30+2500+0+20)/(0.5+4+0.5+0.5)

Vavg=463.64 mph

if answer was needed in m/s

1 mph =0.44704 m/s

Vavg =463.64*0.44704 =207.26 m/s