Desert
Written on 12:56 am by Vja Students
An explorer wishes to cross a barren desert that requires 6 days to cross, but one man can only carry enough food for 4 days. What is the fewest number of other men required to help carry enough food for him to cross?
Solution::
Two other men are required to help the explorer.
The first helper only goes on day into the desert. He feeds the other two men during the first day, so that at the beginning of the second day, he only has one day rations left. So he goes back to camp. On the second day, the second helper feeds himself and the explorer. On the beginning of the third day the helper now has two days rations left so he heads back. The explorer is two days into the journey and still has all four days of his food left, so he continues on alone.
hi,
the explorer would need only two more men..one of them will return after one day and the other after two days..u can do the calculations yourself..they will have 12 packets of food and they need to walk for 2+4+6 days...so that is how they will make it..
only one is required...
it's not written there tht the hepler shud necessarily survive.so he will carry food for two days and will give the rest to the explorer.now the explorer has 4 days of food with four days of journey left.:D
d explorer needs nobody's help. here's how:
let us suppose d explorer needs one packet of food per day nd dat he can carry four packets maximum. also let us suppose dat d explorer cn keep packets safely in d desert wich he can retrieve on later days widout d risk of them being stolen.
so d explorer starts of wid 4 packets nd walks for one day. nw he has 3 packets, of wich he deposits 2 packets there itself, nd returns using d remaining one packet.
he is at starting position again, bt has two packets deposited at distance of 1 day.
so he again takes 4 packets, walks for one day. he has 3 packets in hand so he picks up one of d packets he had kept there earlier, nd walks on wid 4 packets. he walks for 1 day using up 1 packet. out of remaining 3 he deposits 2 nd returns using d 1 packet in hand nd one deposited earlier.
nw he is again at starting position nd has two packets of food deposited at two days distance. so he starts again wid 4 packets, nd using up 2 packets after two days he reaches his deposited packets. he picks up both d packets so he has 4 packets total nd four days journey remaining...... wich he completes happily.