Question

A barge moves 6km/h in still water. It travels 51 km upriver and 51 km downriver in a total time of 114 hr. What is the speed of the current?

Answer 1

Let x be the speed of the current, and \[t _{1}, t _{2}\] be the times to go up and downriver, respectively

Answer 2

Then
\[(6+x)t _{1} + (6-x)t _{2} = 102\] and
\[t _{1}+t _{2}=114\]

Answer 3

\[(6+x)t _{1}=51\]
\[(6-x)t _{2}=51\]
\[t _{1}=114-t _{2}\]
Using these three equations and making substitutions I found the speed to be 5.1km/hr

Answer 4

I'm actually still not too sure i understand this, but I thank you for your fast response. I'll just look at it a bit longer and hopefully I'll get it.

Answer 5

it seems everyone does this problem a different, but i'll figure it out eventually.