Question

NASA launched another space probe, Voyager 2 on August 20, 1977. Voyager 2 is a bit slower than Voyager 1 only traveling 15.4 km/s (34,449 miles per hour). Voyager 2 is 19.3 billion kilometers or 1.93 x 10^10 km (1.2 billion miles) away from the Earth. How many years will it take Voyager 2 from its location to travel to the second closest star (Proxima Centauri) which is 4.24 light years away from Earth? Include all your calculations in your answer. Recall that a light year is 9.5 x 10^12 kilometers.

Answer 1

Using proportions, it is found that it will take Voyager 2 82,900 years from its location to travel to the second closest star.

What is a proportion?

A proportion is a fraction of a total amount, and the measures are related using a rule of three. Due to this, relations between variables, either direct or inverse proportional, can be built to find the desired measures in the problem.

In this problem, the Voyager 2 travels 15.4 km/s. In kilometers per year, considering that one hour has 3600 seconds, the measure is given by:

15.4 x 365 x 24 x 3600 = 485,654,400 km/year.

The distance to Proxima Centauri in km is given by:

d = |1.93 x 10^10 km - 4.24 x 9.5 x 10^12 km| = 4.02607 x 10^13 km.

Hence the time in years is given by:

t = d/v =  4.02607 x 10^13/485,654,400 = 82,900.

It will take Voyager 2 82,900 years from its location to travel to the second closest star.

More can be learned about proportions at brainly.com/question/24372153

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