If a plane travels 2.7 statute miles in 43 seconds, what is the ground speed in knots?

To determine the ground speed in knots, first, we need to convert the distance traveled and time into the appropriate units. A knot is defined as one nautical mile per hour, so we need to convert statute miles to nautical miles and seconds to hours.

1. Convert statute miles to nautical miles: There are 0.868976 nautical miles in a statute mile. Therefore, to convert 2.7 statute miles to nautical miles:

[

2.7 \text{ statute miles} \times 0.868976 \text{ nautical miles/statute mile} \approx 2.345 \text{ nautical miles}

]

2. Convert seconds to hours: There are 3600 seconds in an hour, so to convert 43 seconds to hours:

[

43 \text{ seconds} \div 3600 \text{ seconds/hour} \approx 0.0119444 \text{ hours}

]

3. Calculate ground speed in knots: Now we can calculate ground speed using the formula:

[

\text{Ground Speed (knots)} = \frac{\text{Distance in nautical miles}}{\text{Time in hours