Late lecturer making a mile in random dashes
Question
A lecturer must cover mile in minutes. He makes up to dashes. On dash he covers miles, uniform on , taking minutes, uniform on , with all these values independent. After each dash he starts another only if he has not yet covered a mile and there is still time left, with at most dashes in total. If the minutes expire part-way through a dash, time freezes and he still completes that dash's full distance. He is on time if his total distance reaches at least mile. What is the probability he is on time?
Short answer
. Measure time in units of minutes. The first dash never uses up all the time, so a second dash always happens, and he arrives if (probability ). Otherwise he gets a third dash only if (probability ), and then needs , which given happens with probability . Total: .
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Open the worked solutionLessons behind this question
- Sample Spaces, Events, and the Probability Axioms
- Independence
- Continuous Random Variables and Probability Density Functions
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