Question

A shipping container will be used to transport several 50-kilogram crates across the country by rail. The greatest weight that can be loaded into the container is 27000 kilograms. Other shipments weighing 12900 kilograms have already been loaded into the container. Write and solve an inequality which can be used to determine xx, the number of 50-kilogram crates that can be loaded into the shipping container.

Answer 1

The number of 50-kilogram crates that can be loaded into the shipping container is up to 282, as calculated by the inequality 12900 + 50x ≤ 27000 and solving for x.

Step-by-step explanation:

To determine the number of 50-kilogram crates, x, that can be loaded into the shipping container given that the greatest weight the container can hold is 27,000 kilograms and other shipments already loaded weigh 12,900 kilograms, we'll set up an inequality.

The maximum weight the container can hold is the sum of the weight of the already loaded shipments and the weight of the x number of 50-kilogram crates. Therefore, our inequality will be:

12900 + 50x ≤ 27000

To solve for x, we will first subtract 12900 from both sides of the inequality:

50x ≤ 27000 - 12900

50x ≤ 14100

Now, we will divide both sides by 50 to isolate x:

x ≤ 14100 / 50

x ≤ 282

Thus, up to 282 crates can be loaded into the shipping container.