kunoichipowergirl asked:
It's for my homework, I just can't get it. The problem says:
"Daniela and Jack are hiking a steady incline. They use their GPS device to determine their elevation every 15 minutes. At 15 minutes and 30 minutes they were at elevations of 10,300 feet and 10,900 feet, respectively.
a.Write an equation expressing their elevation in relation to time.
It's for my homework, I just can't get it. The problem says:
"Daniela and Jack are hiking a steady incline. They use their GPS device to determine their elevation every 15 minutes. At 15 minutes and 30 minutes they were at elevations of 10,300 feet and 10,900 feet, respectively.
a.Write an equation expressing their elevation in relation to time.
b.Based on the formula you found above, what is their elevation after one hour?"
Camp Stoves
Sterling Silver Boxes
February 24th, 2010
Camping Discounters
this problem seems to be assuming they will climb at the same rate for the hour…let’s assume that is correct
we will want to find an equation that relates their height at any time, h(t), to the time (t) they climb
in 15 mins, they climbed 900 feet, so if they climb at a steady rate, they climb 40 ft/min
so we know that in t mins, they will climb a distance of 40t
we can also figure out that if they really climb at a constant rate, when t=0, they were at an elevation of 9700 ft, since in the next 15 mins they would climb 600 feet to reach 10,300 as the problem tells us
so, we can combine all these to get:
h(t)=9700+40t where t is the time in mins
after 60 mins, they will be at:
h(t)=9700+40×60=9700+2400=12,100 ft