Marcia flew her ultralight plane to a nearby town against a head wind of 15 km/h in 2h 20 min. the return trip under the same wind conditions took 1h 24min. find the plane's air speed and the distance to the nearby town

The answer to this question would be 60km per hour

Let the distance between the towns be d and the speed of the air be s.

distance = speed * time

convert the minutes time into hours.

When flying into the wind, ground speed will be air speed MINUS wind speed, hence the against the wind trip is described by:

d

s-15

=

7

3

return trip is then:

d

s+15

=

7

5

Cross-multiplying both we get the two-variable system:

3d=7∗ (s-15) 5d=7∗ (s+15)

3d=7s-1055d=7s+105

subtract first equation from second equation we get

2d=210d=105km

Substitute the value of d in the above equations for s.

5∗105=7s+1057s=420s=60km/hr