The Simple Maths of a Car used as a Weapon … METRIC units

Nice Truck Attack 2016 The Independent, UK

Berlin Christmas Maraket Attack 2016, ABC

Melbourne Car Attack 2017.

Cars (and trucks) have been used as weapons by drivers purposefully driving into crowds including:

2014: Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec

2014 : Jerusalem, Israel.

2016: Nice, France

2016: Berlin, Germany

2017: Jerusalem, Israel

2017: Melbourne, Australia.

What does the maths tell us?

Melbourne is Mathspig’s home town. The car attack killed, tragically, 6 people and injured many more. The question many seem to ask is:

Why can’t people get out of the way?

Look at the video below of the Melbourne car. It doesn’t appear to be going that fast. But the maths tells a different story. You need quite a distance between you and a car travelling at approx 60 kph to have enough time to run clear. (See calculations below)

How fast do you react?

We will set your reaction time at 0.4 sec. This allows time for you to react and turn. If you want to test your reaction time go here. But remember you have to turn as well.

How fast would you run?

According to the Telegraph, UK, the average human can run at 15.9 mph (25.6 kph) and the National Council of Strength and Fitness 15 mph (24.1kph), which Mathspig has rounded off to 25 kph.

How do you escape a car travelling at 60 kph towards you when you are less than 9 m away?

Jump upwards!

You might reduce the impact and even go over the roof.

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Fire Fighters Need Maths

-ABC Radio Announcement

Black Saturday Bush Fires Australia

The Fire Season in Australia arrives suddenly. The frightening warning (above) can be heard on the national broadcaster as fires spring up around Australia. It seems no time at all since Aussie fire fighters were helping fight fires in California. Now they’re back. Elvis, The Aircrane, returns form the US for another tour of duty in Victoria.

Aircrane, Elvis, returns to fight bush fires in Australia. Herald Sun

Here is something you may not realise:

And the maths they need is

MIDDLE SCHOOL MATHS.

You can check out a typical Fire Fighter Maths Curriculum here. The significance of the Fire Fighter Maths is that the numbers are shocking. You can look at a wildfire on TV, but when you calculate how much time you have to escape, the answer is truly terrifying.

So here is a Fire Fighter Maths problem from one of Mathspig’s Middle School Worksheets titled:

Fire Fighter Math 1: Wildfire Algebra

METRIC UNITS

On 7^th February 2009 a bushfire began in Victoria Australia that killed 173 people, injured 414 people, destroyed 2,100 homes and displaced 7,562 people. Known as The Black Saturday Bushfires the fire front travelled at up to 600m per 30 seconds. The radiant heat produced was capable of killing people 400 meters away.

Are fire fighters safe in such a fire? How much time do they get to escape the fire in a fire truck even if the fire front is 5 km away? We can do the math:

Q 7: You are a fire fighter in a fire truck when the wind hits the fire front at 120 km/hr. Suddenly, the fire front starts moving at 100 kph. You are, thankfully, in a fire truck but the wind and smoke haze makes driving the truck difficult. You can only make 80 kph along a straight road away from the fire (See pic above). The fire front is 5 km away. How long have you got before the fire front hits?

1. Find S₁ (Fire Front Speed) and S₂ (Fire Truck Speed) in m/sec and kph.
2. Fill in this equation where  d₁   (distance of fire front from point on map) and d₂ (Distance of Fire Truck from the same point on a map)

         d₁ =   d₂   +   ………

   3. Use the following equations to calculate the time t that you have before the flames hit.

USA UNITS

On 7^th February 2009 in The Black Saturday Bushfires the fire front travelled at to 656 yds per 30 seconds. The radiant heat produced was capable of killing people 437 yds away.

Are fire fighters safe in such a fire? How much time do they get to escape the fire in a fire truck even if the fire front is 3.1 miles away? We can do the math. Answers below.

Q 7: You are a fire fighter in a fire truck when the wind hits the fire front at 75 mph. Suddenly, the fire front starts moving at 62 mph. You are, thankfully, in a fire truck but the wind and smoke haze makes driving the truck difficult. You can only make 50 mph along a straight road away from the fire (See pic above). The fire front is 3 miles away. How long have you got before the fire front hits?

1. Find S₁ (Fire Front Speed) and S₂ (Fire Truck Speed) in ft/sec and mph  
2. Fill in this equation where  d₁   (distance of fire front from point on map) and d₂ (Distance of Fire Truck from the same point on a map)

         d₁ =   d₂   +   ………

    3. Use the following equations to calculate the time t that you have before the flames hit.

WORKSHEETS

Fire Fighter Math 1: Wildfire Algebra You will find the worksheets in both METRIC & USA Units Here. Yes! There is a small fee. Mathspig and Roni the Rodent (left) have this very, very slow get rich quick scheme going. Ha!

Lesson Plan:

Students discover that fire fighters need middle-school math. Students complete some warm-up exercises involving unit conversions (mph to ft/sec or kph to m/sec) without and with a calculator and then they simplify algebraic expressions and solve simultaneous equations. Students use this math to calculate real life fire front speeds that fire fighters have faced in Montana, USA and Victoria, Australia. The power of this math is that the calculations are based on the stories about and conditions faced by these real fire fighters. No lectures are needed on the danger of wildfires as the numbers speak for themselves.

How Oops! Try again Maths is killing us …………………………………………………………………………… MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig ….…. with Kerry Cue

The New Age of Guess-amatics!

Hellooooo Sweeties,………………………………………………………………………

Some frightening maths this week. When researching DANGEROUS MATHS, Mathspig found one branch of maths is the most dangerous maths of all. Let’s call it GUESS-AMATICS. Today, maths is often taught via computer program packages. Some of these computer packages turn maths into a guessing game.

This exact and rather frightening scenario was described to me by the mother of a 5 year old. The mother decided it was time to turn the game off. When students play mathematical computer games too often they don’t have to think, they just guess the answer and try again. But be warned this ‘Oops! Try again’ maths can kill you’! Some maths you cannot ‘try again’. You HAVE to get it right the first time. Medication is one area where ‘Oops! Try again maths kills”

Do the Maths and Do NO HARM.

You need sufficient maths to understand medication doses or you might do yourself harm.…………………………………………………………………………………..

And here is just one very frightening statistic:……………………………………..

According to FDA data 1.3 million people in the USA are injured each year from medication errors.

Meanwhile, we need nurses, caregivers, doctors, paramedics, First Aide volunteers, parents, grandparents, babysitters, teachers and all health care professionals to have sufficient maths to be able to calculate simple medication doses. Or we need them to simply READ the dose and make sure it is correct. Unfortunately, many of those who should be able to work out medication doses are either incapable or not paying attention. And your life could be in their hands:

UK

In the UK 1 in 20 hospital deaths is due to medical error. Nearly 12,000 patients die needlessly in hospital every year due to blunders by staff, researchers warn. Drugs or fluid mismanagement  was identified as a problem in 21% of preventable deaths (NHS   2012) or, doing the maths, 21% of 12,000 is approx 2,500 deaths due to bad maths!

USA

According to a new study just out from the prestigious Journal of Patient Safety, four times as many people die from preventable medical errors than we thought, as many as 440,000 a year.

Canada

Reports show between 9,000 and 24,000 hospital deaths due to medical error.

Australia

Official Australian government reports reveal that preventable medical error in hospitals is responsible for 11% of all deaths in Australia or 1 in 9 deaths.

………………………………………………………….

Other DANGEROUS MATHS include:

Dangerous Maths 1:Young drunk dead

Dangerous Maths 2: Death by Snake, Spider, Quad bike, Kangaroo, Raccoon and Vomit

Dangerous Maths 3: Shark Attack

Take care and do the maths……………………………………………………

Hoo Roo………………………………………………………………………………

Mathspig

Dangerous Maths 3: Shark Attack

Aussie Pro surfer, Mick Fanning, grabbed world attention when he was attacked by a shark in the Fanning J-Bay Open, South Africa on Sunday 19 July, 2015. Fanning was knocked off his board and forced to fight for his life. He survived. News.com

One shark expert suggested the shark was a young great white shark under 3.5 metres.

Would you survive a shark attack?

Let’s do the maths.

How fast can a shark swim?

According to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History:The torpedo shape of the great white is built for speed: up to 35 miles per hour (50 kilometers per hour). And then there are the teeth — 300 total in up to seven rows.

How fast can you swim?

According to Junior Olympic Games Qualifying Times 2015

For 13-14 yo 100m freestyle:

t girl = 1.15 or 75sec

t boy =1.10. Or 70 sec

Lets assure you are an average swimmer but highly motivated on seeing a shark:

t kid = 100 secs

So you can swim 100m in 100 sec. But will you survive??????

 Surf Lesson Bluey’s Beach NSW 2009

We’re sooo tough in Australia! Shark, Smark! Whatever.

Picture from Daily Telegraph

Also according to the Smithsonian: Sharks can detect both the direction and amount of movement made by prey, even from as far as 820 feet (250 meters) away.

But there is hope as, according to the National Geographic Channel, Most shark attacks occur less than 100 feet or 30.5 m from the shore mainly around popular beaches in North America (especially Florida and Hawaii), Australia, and South Africa. 

Again we will assume that the swimmer is 30m offshore when he sees the shark fin 250m away. But this time we will have the world’s fastest swimmer. This time we are talking Dav vs Shark!!!!!!!!!

MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig MathsPig …………………………………………………. with Kerry Cue

Hellooooo My Little Sweeties,

There is so much maths you can do with m&ms, it’s hard to believe there is any other sort of maths.

You can study:

Counting, times tables, set theory, Bar graphs, Fractions, % and decimals, Mean, median, mode, and parabolas (using a really cool peg-powered catapult).

But my favouritest ,developed by Patrick Len, is using m&ms to demonstrate half life in radioactive substances and therefore write an exponential equation.

m+m ACTIVITY:

Throw a fixed no. m&ms on a table. Mathspig chose 128 m&ms for a very good reason. Eat the ones with the m showing. Count remainder. Throw again. Eat the ones with the m showing. Count remained. Keep doing this. You will end up with results like the following. (Not identical as chance is involved)

Wow! m&m’s and exponential equations. How yummy is that!!!!!!

More yummy maths:

m+m maths 1: find the volume using m+ms!

m+m maths 2: Guess, NO, calculate the number of m+ms in a jar!

m+m maths 3: how many m+ms will kill you?

m+m maths 4: How many m+ms will kill my dog?

m+m maths 5: how many m+ms will kill my cat?

m+m maths 6: How many m+ms will kill my pet rat?

m+ms maths 7: how many m+ms will kill my pet mouse?

Mmmmmmm! Can’t talk. Face full of chocolate.

Bye bye

Mathspig

m+m maths 1: find the volume using m+ms!

Are you bored by doing volume calculations?

Are you looking for a new and exciting way to calculate the volume of, well, things maths teachers ask you to calculate the volume of? Like what? You know, cubes or cylinders or cones or stuff. Well, today mathspiggies, we have the perfect solution for you. Yes!

We will calculate volume by counting m&ms!!!!  Do I hear any complaints???? Anyone!!! Right!

WARNING: You may need a ship load of m&ms!!! Just saying.

Mathspig salutes CWanamaker for doing maths over and above the call of duty by actually measuring how many m&ms fit in various containers. He has provided us with the RPR (RAndom Packing Ratio) for m&ms(below) and you will find his experiments here.

Two things you may need to know:

   1 fl ounce (US) = 29.6 ml

              1cm³  = 1 ml 

If you are like me, mathspiggies, you will be amaaaazed how many m&ms it takes to fill, say, a coffee mug. Nevertheless, you can calculate the volume from the no. of m&ms and you will find the answers here:m&m maths answers

 

m+m maths 2: Guess, NO, calculate the number of m+ms in a jar!

Of course, mathspiggies, we can do the reverse maths and cheat … and use our superior maths skills to calculate the no. of m&ms in a cookie jar and then you WIN the cookie jar full of m&ms at the school fair.