Question

A helicopter hovers 40 ft above the ground.Then the helicopter climbs at a rate of 21 ft/s. Write a rule that represents the helicopter's height h above the ground as a function of time t. What is the helicopter's height after 45 s

Answer 1

Since the rate is constant, the growth of the height of the helicopter follows a linear pattern. The helicopter has an initial quota of 40ft, so that would be the constant term. The linear terms's coefficient is the rate of growth, so 21 ft/s. So, if $t$ is the number of seconds passed from when the observation started, we have

$h(t) = 40+21t$

Which means that, if $t=45$, the height is

$h(45)=40+21\cdot45 = 40+945=985$