The Erickson Air-Crane helicopter can scoop water and douse a certain forest fir

Question

The Erickson Air-Crane helicopter can scoop water and douse a certain forest fire four times as fast as an S-58T helicopter. Working together, the two helicopters can douse the fire in 8 hours. How long would it take each helicopter, working alone, to douse the fire?

Explanation / Answer

To answer this problem we can look as a substitution problem. The Erickson Air-Crane (represented by E) can perform the task 4x as fast as the S-58T (represented by S). Therefore the equation is: E = 4*S Our second equation is based upon the section: "the two helicopters can douse the fire in 8 hours." That would mean that the time of the two helicopters (E and S) added together is equal to 8. The equation would be: E + S = 8 We can substitute 4*S for E in the second equation to get: 4*S + S = 8 Simplify: 5*S = 8 -----> S = 8/5 or 1.6 hours So the S-58T can perform the task in 1.6 hours. Substituting 1.6 in for S in the first equation, we get: E = 4*1.6 Multiplying: E = 6.4 Therefore it takes the Erickson Air-Crane 6.4 hours to perform the task. Finished!

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