SOLUTION: Bing rowed his boat down the river and back. Normally, in still water, he rows a constant 10 km per hour. The river had a steady current that made him faster on the way down, the

Question 1023606: Bing rowed his boat down the river and back. Normally, in still water, he rows a constant 10 km per hour. The river had a steady current that made him faster on the way down, then slowed him down by the exact same amount on the way back. How fast was this current, if it took him 3 hours to row up and 2 hours to row back?
Answer by josmiceli(19441) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Let = the speed of the current in km/hr
= the speed of the boat going downstream in km/hr
= the speed of the boat going upstream in km/hr
Let = the one-way distance the boat traveled in km
----------------------------------------------
Equation for going downstream:
(1)
Equation for going upstream:
(2)
---------------------------
By substitution:

The speed of the current is 2 km/hr
------------------------------
check:
(1)
(1)
(1)
(1) km
and
(2)
(2)
(2)
(2) km
OK
RELATED QUESTIONS
A boat travels 12 miles up the Mississippi River and 12 miles back down river in a total... (answered by mananth,josmiceli)

A MAN ROWED 10 KM UP A RIVER IN 5 HOURS AND BACK IN 21 AND A HALF HOURS. FIND THE RATE OF (answered by josmiceli)

A man travels 40km down a river and back in 6 hours. If the speed of river current is... (answered by lwsshak3)

I need the equation for the following problem: My motor boat normally travels at 24... (answered by ikleyn)

Bill rows his boat at 10 miles per hour. He rowed 20 miles down a stream and then rowed... (answered by ikleyn,stanbon)

A man can row at 6km/h in still water. He rows 8km up a river and then back again, taking (answered by jorel1380)

A river has two bridges spanning it that are exactly one mile from each other. While... (answered by ankor@dixie-net.com)

A boat took 2 hours to make a trip down river. The same boat took 10 hours to make the... (answered by ankor@dixie-net.com)

A crew team rows a boat at a rate of 20 km/h in still water. In practice on a river, the... (answered by lynnlo)