SOLUTION: Four survivors in a lifeboat have enough water for 12 days. Calculate how long the water would have lasted if there had been six people on the the lifeboat.

Question 1189847: Four survivors in a lifeboat have enough water for 12 days. Calculate how long the water would have lasted if there had been six people on the the lifeboat.
Found 2 solutions by ikleyn, Theo:
Answer by ikleyn(52908) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
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Four survivors in a lifeboat have enough water for 12 days.
Calculate how long the water would have lasted if there had been six people on the the lifeboat.
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They have now 4*12 = 48 portions of water on board. For 6 people, it is enough precisely for 48/6 = 8 days. ANSWER

Solved.

Answer by Theo(13342) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
4 survivors have enough water to last 12 days.
inverse variation formula is y = k/x
if y = 12 and x = 4, then 12 = k/4 leading to k = 48.
when x = 6, the formula becomes:
y = 48/6 = 8,
if the water would have lasted 12 days with 4 people, then the water will last 8 days with 6 people.
that should be your answer.

you can also look at this as a people * rate * time = quantity type problem.
the time is 12 days.
the quantity is q liters of water.
the number of people is 4.
the formula becomes:
4 * r * 12 = q
r is equal to the rate that each person consumes water.
solve for r to get:
r = q / (12 * 4)
this becomes:
r = q / 48
this says that each person consumes 1/48 * the quantity of water each day.
the formula for 4 poeple becomes:
4 * q/48 * 12 = q
when the number of people is 6, the formula becomes:
6 * q/48 * t = q
t is the time in days.
6 * q/48 * t = q becomes:
6/48 * q * t = q
divide both sides of the eqution by q to get:
6/48 * t = 1
solve for t to get:
t = 48/6 which becomes:
t = 8.

you get 8 days with 6 people either way.
that appears to be your solution.
i'll be surprised if it isn't.

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