How many grains of sand would it take to fill up the Pacific Ocean

1.  Background Story

          My fermi problem is: How many grains of sand would it take to fill up the Pacific

Ocean? I picked this question because I felt it was interesting and it involves almost all

the things we had to check off for a fermi problem and the final answer or result will be

huge. I also chossed this because I wanted to challenge myself and really put my

math/science skills to the test.

2.  Ask Yourself This:  

       What's with length, width and height of an average grand of sand?

       How many square feet are there in the Pacific Ocean?

       How many 1mm grains of sand would fit in a square foot?

       How many cubic feet is the Pacific Ocean?

       How many 1mm grains of sand would fit in a cubic foot?

       How deep is the Pacific Ocean?

How many gallons of milk do cows give off in one day in Asia?

1.  Background Story:

How many gallons of milk are milked from cows every day in Asia?

I chose this because it followed all the rules. It involves a very large number. There is a place and a certain time. This cannot be googled and it sounds like something fun to do.

2.  Ask Yourself This:  

How many cows are in Asia?

How many gallons of milk does a cow in Asia make?

How many cows come to or leave Asia?

3.  Helpful Hints 

a.  

There are 390 million cows in Asia

       http://www.peta.org/living/vegetarian-living/top-10-reasons-not-to-eat-cows.aspx

The average amount of gallons that a cow in Asia makes per day is 4-5 gallons. 

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_gallons_of_milk_does_a_cow_produce_each_day?adt=0#page1

 Cows do go in and out of Asia      

b.

I do not have the exact amount of gallons that a cow makes in Asia but I do have it probably in the U.S. but cows in Asia don't get fed and cared for anywhere near as well so they make less milk. 

4.  Construct a Formula:

What I would have to do is use the info I have. I know that there are 390 million cows in Asia and each cow can make an average of 4-5 gallons. I would have to multiply 5 gallons by 390 million cows in Asia.  I estimated that Asian cows would make around 5 gallons.

5.  Messy Math: 

        

   My problem was the 390 million cows multiplied by the five gallons of milk that a cows makes in Asia.

  

6.  Answer:  

The answer is 3.9x10^7 gallons of milk     

     The population of China is 1.3608x10^9 people                                                   

How many boards did it take to build the coverage bridge

1.  Background Story:

 Have you ever wondered how many boards there are on the covered bridge in Waitsfield in town. Now if you have had to time to think about that you must of been pretty curious. I chose this question because I didn't think that Google would have this answer for me.

2.  Ask Yourself This:


What is the area of the covered bridge ?

How long is the covered bridge ?

What is the height of the covered bridge?

What is the width of the covered bridge ?






3.  Helpful Hints:
a.
The covered bridge is 105 feet long.

The height is 9,6 ft

15.5 ft.wide





4.  Construct a Formula:

I will have to find the area and then estimate that  the  boards for the platform is 16 ft long at the most and then there are two beams on the bottom. Then the Sides  will have to be  estimated.



5.  Messy Math:
H x W to find area of bridge
105 ft long.
5,6ft to peak
height 9,6ft
Boards for side of bridge are 1 x 6

105 d 6 = 175 boards for one side
350 boards on all for sides.

There are 21 boards that divide up the windows on the side with windows.

Platform made with 4 x 6 x 22
4 brds that go straight down for the length of the bridge.
12 going across width with 4 brds in length would mean 12 x 4 = 48 brds

Roof
W d 2
11 trusses for ceiling
10 cross boards
24 2 x 6
 44 boards for the roof .










6.  Answer:


350 side boards
21 window boards
24 platform boards
11 trusses
13 side wall supports
78 roof boards

497 boards it took to build the covered bridge.

How many lacrosse balls will it take to fill the Atlantic Ocean

1.  Background Story: 

 Have you ever wondered how big a lacrosse ball is? My question is how many lacrosse balls will it take to fit in the Atlantic Ocean. I chose this question because I really like lacrosse and it seems like it will be cool to see a comparison how big the Atlantic Ocean is. 

2.  Ask Yourself This: .

What's the volume of the Atlantic Ocean?

How many cubed inches will a lacrosse ball take up?

How will I fill the space in between balls because they are round they will not stack up. 

3.  Helpful Hints:  

.

3 x 10^20L that's how many liters of water. About 320 million cubic kilometers. Or 80 million cubic miles. 

3.20000000

8 places 

3.2x10^8

http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/atlantic.html

http://www.reefnews.com/reefnews/infopage/oceans/ocean.html

.

a lacrosse ball is about 2’’ around and 2’’ tall and when they stack up, there will be a space in between the balls that will not be filled. It will not be filled because when you stack up lacrosse balls, they are round so there is space in between.

4.  Construct a Formula: .

Diameter .times half mile times those balls acrosse times miles up 

You multiply by half mile because each ball is two inches so if you multiply by half mile you'd get a mile long line of lacrosse balls. 

What I will do in order to find out how many lacrosse balls will fit into the Atlantic Ocean is find out how many miles cubed the Atlantic Ocean is, then I'll find out how many lacrosse balls will fit into one cubic mile. Then multiply that number by how many cubic miles there is in the Atlantic Ocean. Which will get you to the answer. 

5.  Messy Math: .

2"x2640'x2640'x8x10^6m=1115136x10^8 lacrosse balls. 

(Need to include all your units here - scientific notation?)

6.  Answer:  

There is about 1115136x10^8 lacrosse balls. And that's not including all the space in between the balls that's not filled up. Imagine how many it would be if you filled the space between balls

How many light are in all the schools in Vermont?

 


1.  Background Story:

For my Fermi problem I have decided to do it on, how many lights are in all the schools in Vermont? I got interested in this question because I was curious about how many lights were in Harwood but it would be too small of a number and I could just count, though it would take awhile. So Mr. Wagner told me that I should research how many light were in all the middle and high schools in Vermont.


2.  Ask Yourself This:

How many schools are in Washington county?

How many counties are in Vermont?

How many lights per class room?

How many class rooms are in a middle/high school?

3.  Helpful Hints:

Question 1 Answer; there are 21 schools in Washington county.
http://www.greatschools.org/schools/districts/Vermont/VT

Question 2 Answer; there are 14 counties in Vermont.
 http://www.greatschools.org/schools/districts/Vermont/VT

Question 3 Answer; there approximately 54 class rooms in middle/high schools

Question 3 Answer; I think that that there is about 20-36 light per class room because I counted how many lights were in 4 of the core class rooms and got a number between 20 & 36.


4.  Construct a Formula:

                   lights  *   class rooms *  schools  *  counties  =  lights
            classrooms      schools    counties     Vermont   Vermont

5.  Messy Math:

   36 Lights   *  54 CR*   21 S *  14 C =    571,536 lights
      1 CR            1 S       1 C     1 VT              1 VT


6.  Answer:
 There are approximately 571,536 lights in all the middle and high school class rooms in Vermont together.

If all the trees in Vermont were cut down, how much 11 by 8 1/2 inchpaper could be made?

Vermont being a very mountainous and fertile place, has many trees. Maria and Stephen were outside on a walk up the mountain and were flabbergasted by the amount of trees they could see when the got to the top. This made them think, if all the trees in Vermont were cut down then how much 11x81/2 paper could be made?

How many trees are in Vermont? How many trees does it take to make 11x81/2 paper? What kind of trees provide what kind of paper amount? Tree sizes? How many acres are in Vermont?

1) 187 trees per acre in Vermont.

(http://www.vtfpr.org/util/for_utilize_stats.cfm)

2) One tree produces 80,500 pieces of printer paper (11x81/2).

(http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/green-science/question16.htm)

3)To make this a somewhat easy test I am going to say that every tree produces the same amount of paper.

(The website I used to find paper per tree is in helpful hint 3)

4) Since trees vary in sizes I am going to use the normal size tree, an adult tree.

(This is the size of the tree that is used to get 80,500 pieces of paper, "Most are about 1 foot in diameter and 60 feet tall. Ignoring taper, that's about 81,430 cubic inches of wood:" I used the same website as the one in helpful hint 2)

5) There are 6,158,607 acres in Vermont.

(http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_acres_is_in_.97_acres#page1) 

One Pine tree produces 80,500 pieces of 11x81/2 inch paper. Since there are a variety of trees in Vermont, I am going to assume that all of the trees are pines.

To find the answer, you need to know how many trees are in an acre and how many acres are in Vermont. You also need to know how much paper a single tree produces. When you have this information you first want to find out how much paper is made per acre. To find this you multiply the number of trees per acre by the amount of paper produced by a single tree. Once you know how much paper is made per acre, you want to multiply that by how many acres are in Vermont. Then you will have your answer in paper/Vermonts total acres. 

If one tree produces 80,500 pieces of 11 x 81/2 paper and they are 187 trees in 1 acre than 1.50535 x 10^7 pieces of 11x81/2 paper are produced in one acre. There are 6.158607 x 10^6 acres in Vermont so if there are 1.50535 x 10^7 pieces of paper per acre then in Vermont, if you used all the trees to make paper then, you would get 9.270859 x 10^13 pieces of paper made from ally he trees in Vermont.

80,500 x 187 = 1.50535 x 10^7 pieces of paper per acre

1.50535 x 10^6 x 6.158607 x 10^7 = 9.270859 x 10^13 pieces of paper in Vermont

That is equal to 92,708,590,000,000,000,000 which is also equal to 185,417,180,000,000,000 reams of paper (500 papers per ream)

By using the fermi method, I predicted how much 11x81/2 could be made from all the trees in Vermont. My prediction is that if all the trees in Vermont were cut down to make paper, you could make 92,708,590,000,000,000,000 pieces of printer paper. (Shown in #5)

How many grains of sand are in the Sahara Desert?

1.  Background Story:

 I chose to do how many grains of sand are in the Sahara desert because I wanted to do one that would come out with a really big complicated number.




2.  Ask Yourself This:

I'm doing like more of a layer, like a blanket of sand over the Sahara desert so I don't have to do the volume.

how many square miles are in the Sahara desert.

 How many grains of sand are in a square foot

 How many square feet are in a square mile



3.  Helpful Hints:


how many square miles are in the Sahara desert: 3.629 million sq miles (9.4 million km²)

How many grains of sand are in a square foot: 45,000

 How many square feet are in a square mile: 27,878,400 square feet


I rounded the numbers to make them more simple. And I also didn't do the depth of the sand so there Is probably more sand then what my information would allow you to get. But for the layer of sand over the Sahara there are 4.51926632x10^16





4.  Construct a Formula:
Amount of grains of sand per square foot X how many square miles are in the Sahara X how many square miles are in the Sahara desert.

How long would it take two rats to fill up Lake Superior with rats?

Background Story:  

It is a fairly common saying: breeding like rats. Or, multiplying like rats. One day after hearing this saying, I wondered, "How fast would two rats take to breed enough to fill up a swimming pool with rats?" I decided to expand this into the fermi problem:How long would two adult brown rats take to breed enough to fill up Lake Superior, if they had an unlimited supply of food and water?(I also assumed that there was only one breeding pair of rats at a time.) My reason for choosing brown rats is because they are the most widespread species of rats. 

Ask Yourself This:  

How long is a brown rat's life span?

How long does it take a brown rat to mature enough to breed?

How long is a brown rat's breeding cycle (how long between litters)

How large is an average brown rat litter?

What is the volume of an average brown rat?

What is the volume of Lake Superior?

Helpful Hints:  

a.  

Rat data

Data from http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/accounts/Rattus_norvegicus/

Gestation period: about 23 days

Males usually reach sexual maturity at 3-4 months

Females usually reach sexual maturity at 3-4 months

Around 18 hours after giving birth, the female mates again

Typical lifespan: 2-3 years (30 months)

Number of rats per litter: about 8

Data from:http://www.arkive.org/brown-rat/rattus-norvegicus/ 

Head/body length of a brown rat: 20-28 cm

Tail length:17-23 cm

Data from:http://www.epa.gov/greatlakes/factsheet.html 

Lake Superior info

Volume: About 23,000 cubic km 

b.  

Length between  brown rat litters: 23.75 days

23 days = 552 hrs   552 hrs + 18 hrs = 570 hrs

570 hrs/ 24 hrs= 23.75 days

Volume of a brown rat: 2646 cubic cm

I estimated based on a diagram that the ratio of height to body length is about 3.5:8, and that the height and width were about the same. Since the  body length is about 24 cm, and 24 cm is 8 x 3, I multiplied 3.5(height in the ratio of height to body length) by 3 to get 10.5 cm, which is the height of an average brown rat. Then, I multiplied length and height to get 252 square cm for the area. I multiplied that by the width to get 2646 cubic cm.

Construct a Formula:  

First, I’ll have to divide the volume of Lake Superior by the volume of each rat, to find out how many rats we need to fill it up. Next I’ll divide the rat’s life span(minus 3.5 months) by the length between litters, to find the # of times 2 rats can mate in their lifetimes. Then I’ll have to multiply that # by the # of rats per litter, to find how many babies those rats make in their lifetimes. Then I’ll divide the number of rats it takes to fill up Lake Superior by that number, to find how many rat life spans it will take to fill up Lake Superior. 

Since each rat lifespan is 2.5 years, I’ll multiply that # by 2.5. Along the way, I’ll also have to exchange the units.

*

Sorry if this is a little faint.

Messy Math:  

*

Again, sorry if this is a little faint. Also, I kind of had a hard time doing the last part in fractions.

Answer:  

If two brown rats had an unlimited amount of food and water, it would take them about 2.15x10^23 years to fill up Lake Superior with rats.

If you stacked all the sheets of homework one middle schooler does in one year, how tall would the pile be?

Everybody knows that a piece of paper isn't thick at all but can something so thin add up over time? This is one of the things that will hopefully be answered in my fermi problemy. My questions is if you stacked all the homework papers that one harwood eighth grader gets in one school year how tall would the stack be? I chose this question because I often hear kids saying "I have piles of work to do"  Is this just people being dramatic or is there some truth this? I want to know how much homework do we do every year.

To find the answer to my problem I must first answer the following questions.

How thick is the average piece of paper?

On average how many sheets of homework does the average harwood middle school student get each night?

How long is our school year?

I know that 500 sheets of papers makes an inch. I learned that harwood school year is 170 days. From Ms. Curren I learned that the average 8th grader gets 2-3 pages of homework each night. I estimate that 2 to 3 pages is about 2.5 pages. If I calculate the thickness of a sheet of paper by dividing  an inch by 500 (papers) it would come out to be 0.002 . My sources were Mrs. Current, Mrs Therrein and mathforum.org.

 To solve this in  a mathematical formula first I would put all of my data into fractions. The fractions should be set up so that I end with the amount of pages over one year

How many elephants would fit into the Empire State building

Name __Wesley Lowe________________________________________

1.  Background Story:

My Fermi problem is, how many elephants can fit into the Empire State Building. I chose this problem because it has many variables to test. The variables are, how old is the elephant, and is it a boy or girl.

2.  Ask Yourself This:

How many square feet are there in one floor of the Empire State Building? How many floors are there in the Empire State Building? What is the average size of an adult elephant?

3.  Helpful Hints:

there are 102 Floors in the Empire State Building. There is exactly 2,768,591 square feet of usable space in the empire state building. The average size of a female African elephant is cubic feet  is 176 square feet.

4.  Construct a Formula:

multiply the amount of elephants by the average size of one floor, and then you multiply that number by the amount of floors.

5.  Messy Math:  

2,768,591 square feet in the empire state building divided by 102 floors= 27,143 square feet in one floor of the empire state building.

27,143 square feet in one floor divided by 170 square feet in one elephant= 159 elephants, per floor.

159 elephants multiplied by 102 floors= 16,218 elephants fit in the empire state building.

6.  Answer:  

The answer to my problem (how many elephants would fit into the empire state building?) is approximately 16,218 average size female elephants.

How Many Sheep Would it Take to Make a Wool Blanket that Covers the Earth, and What Percent of Those do We Have Right Now

Fermi Method Organizer

Name Erin Magill, Blue

1.  Background Story:
How many sheep would it take to use their wool to make a blanket that covers the world, and what percentage of those sheep do we have? I chose this question because it is very large and complex, but solvable. I was thinking about things going around the world, and the most interesting one was a blanket. Then, to make it more complicated, I asked how many sheep that would take and how many of those are actually on the earth right now.





2.  Ask Yourself This:
What is the surface area of the Earth?
How many sheep are there on Earth?
How much wool is on an average sheep?
What is the density of wool?
What is the average  thickness of a blanket?


3.  Helpful Hints:
The surface area of the Earth is 150,000,000 sq. km, or 1,500,000,000,000,000,000 sq centimeters. That’s 1.5*1018.
There are 1,200,000 sheep on Earth
There’s 3000 grams of wool on each sheep.
Wool is 1.314 grams per cubic centimeter.
The blanket is 2 millimeters thick.
Sources- wikianswers.com
hypertextbook.com
sheep101.info


I measured blankets around my house, and decided that most of them were about  two millimeters or 0.2 centimeters thick.






3.  Helpful Hints:
The surface area of the Earth is 150,000,000 sq. km, or 1,500,000,000,000,000,000 sq centimeters. That’s 1.5*1018.
There are 1,200,000 sheep on Earth
There’s 3000 grams of wool on each sheep.
Wool is 1.314 grams per cubic centimeter.
The blanket is 2 millimeters thick.
Sources- wikianswers.com

hypertextbook.com
sheep101.info


I measured blankets around my house, and decided that most of them were about  two millimeters or 0.2 centimeters thick.




4.  Construct a Formula:
1sheep     *           1.314g     * 0.2 cm      * 1.5*1017 cm2    = sheep
3000 g                      1 cm3 1 blanket 1 earth          3000 earth blankets

sheep sheep
3000 earth blankets     divided by 3000=   1 earth blanket

sheep sheep        
earth right now  divided by  earth blanket = percentage of sheep needed that we have

I need to multiply 1 sheep per 3000 grams by 1.314 grams per 1 cm3 by 0.2 centimeters per blanket by 1.5*1017 cm2 per earth. That gives me answer for 3000 blankets, so then I divide the whole thing by 3000 to simplify it. Then I find the percentage of sheep necessary to make the earth blanket that we have right now by dividing the sheep we have by the sheep we need. The answer will be that percentage.


5.  Messy Math:
1sheep     *  1.314g    *0.2 cm     *1.5*1018   = 3.942*10 17 sheep
3000 g              1 cm3      1 blanket        1 earth     3000 earth blankets


Solving the formula
1sheep*1.314g*0.2cm=0.2628 wool times width of blanket      

0.2628 wool times width of blanket*(1.5*10 18)area of earth
          Multiplying those scientific notations
                                         0.2628*1.5=0.3942
                                         3.942*1017 sheep per 3000 earth blankets

Simplifying for 1 earth blanket
3000 blankets=3*103 blankets           (3.942*1017)divided by(3*103)blankets
                                                       3.942 divided by 3=1.314         17-3=14
                                                   1.314*1014 sheep per 1 earth blanket
Finding the percentage we have right now
(1.2*105) divided by (1.314*1014)
1.2 divided by 1.314=0.913242 5-14=(-9)

9.13242*10-10=.000000000913242=0.0000000913242% of the sheep necessary to make a wool blanket that covers the world are alive right now

6.  Answer:  This is where you can simplify your answer (round it off!) and provide context for your answer (put it into terms that someone else could understand).

About 0.00000009% of the sheep that are necessary to make a blanket that covers the earth are alive right now. That’s 9 quintillionth percent, or 9 septillionths, which is so tiny it’s hard to even think about. The number of sheep we have right now comes nowhere close to the number necessary, even though the blanket is only 2 millimeters thick.
This is the rubric that will be used to assess your Fermi work.   Please review it before you begin your research.

How many zoo animals does it take to fill up the biggest zoo in the world?

1.  Background Story:

How many Zoo animals (all land) does it take to fill up the biggest Zoo in the world with animals (in cages) and a place for people to walk, sit, play, and eat (inside and outside)?  I wanted to solve this question because I am interested in animals especially zoo animals and so that gave me the thought about all the different types of zoo animals and how many animals can fit in one zoo.

2.  Ask Yourself This:

1. What sizes are the cages? (Length and width)?

2. How many species?

3. What is the width of the path that the people can walk on?

(How big is a normal side walk?)

4. How big is the eating area, the store (where the food is) and the playing area.

( how big is a typical restraunt at a zoo in sq ft?)

5. How big is the biggest zoo in the world? (in acres)

6. How many animals per cage

7. How close are the cages to each other?

3.  Helpful Hints:  

a.  1. 750 acres http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/the-biggest/the-top-10-largest-zoos-in-the-world/  

2. 491 species http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/the-biggest/the-top-10-largest-zoos-in-the-world/

3. Normal sidewalk= 2 feet  (estimated)

4. restraunt= 900 sq ft 225ft/1side

5. cages= 6*5 meters  ( 19ft by 16 ft) 35 feet

6. Two-three animals per cage depending on how big the animals are. (Typically at every zoo I have gone to)

7. The cages are 10 ft away from each other but there is a walking space in between. (Estimated)

8. Playing area = 10ft*10ft (estimated)

b.  I found the width of a normal walkway and then I added it by 2.5 feet bacause I think the paved walkway should by wider for people to walk on.  I estimated the zoo walkway because there are all different sizes of them and so I added 2.5 feet onto a normal size of a sidewalk which was 2feet

normal sidewalk= 2 feet

Zoo walkway= 4.5 feet

2ft+2.5ft= 4.5 feet

4.  Construct a Formula:  

I can add the width of the sidewalk+ the length and width of the play area, the eating area,the store/shop,( all in feet) to find how much space there is for the cages . After I get that answer I find how many animals per cage and then multiplied that by how many cages there are,  will find that by subtracting the amount of sq ft everything else takes up from the amount a space a cage takes up,  and from there I can get that answer.

5.  Messy Math:  

1acre= 43,560sq ft.                                                               326,700,00Ft

32670000/1104.5 ft= 3267.0000Ft                                                      

750 acres= 32670000. Sqft     3267SqFt

4.5ft+100ft+ 100sqft+ 900sqft=1104.5 SqFt

Animals per cage= 2

3267.- 35 feet=3,232 feet

3,232/10 feet(between cages)=323 cages

323 cages*2 animals per cage= 646 animals

6.  Answer:  

2 animals per cage and 323 cages. 323 cages*2 animals per cage= 646 animals at the zoo.

323*2+646 animals at the zoo

How many seeds in every pomegranate grown In California every year?

Fermi Method Organizer
Name Maeghan Badger



1.  Background Story:
pomegranate
 How many seeds are in all of the pomegranates that are grown in California in a year? I chose this question because I love pomegranates and I have always wondered how many seeds come in one pomegranate on average. So wondering this I wanted to know how many seeds came in all of the pomegranates grown in California in a year?

2.  Ask Yourself This:
- how many pomegranates are grown in California in a year?

- how many seeds come in one pomegranate?

- how many pomegranate farms are in California?

3.  Helpful Hints:
-About 600 seeds on average for an average size pomegranate.

- About 150 to 200 pomegranate trees on one aecr of land.

-There are abot 2,500 acres of pomegranates in California
 About 9 pomes per tree

-For the average seeds in a pomegranate I took 2 pomegranates and de seeded them. I came up with about 600 seeds per pomegranate.

4.Construct a formula:

Y= 600*2,500


5.  Messy Math:

200 trees per acre* 2,500 acres of pomegranates = 500,000trees

500,000trees* 9 pomegranates per tree= 4,500,000 pomegranates

4,500,000*600=2,700,000,000

2,700,000,000pomegranate seeds


.  Answer:
2,700,000,000 seeds in every pomegranate grown in California every year.

Fermi Method Organizer

Name Posy LaBombard

This organizer will be used as a “notes” version (much like an outline) for your writing.  You will use these notes to create a 1st draft of your Fermi Blog.  

I'm sure sometime or another you've seen, eaten, or caught a crayfish. They're small, fast crustaceans that actively populate the U.S. Over the summer, I caught crayfish with some friends. This inspired my question: If we were to take all of America's USA flag poles, how many crayfish would it take to fill them?

How many crayfish does it take to fill up all of the U.S.'s flagpoles?

How many flag poles are there in the U.S.?- average 

What is the volume of the average crayfish?

What is the volume of the average flag pole?

How many schools in U.S.?

How many YMCA camps in US?

Average flagpole is 20 ft high     

Total number of public schools = 98706        (http://www.edreform.com/2012/04/k-12-facts/)

Standard school flagpole 15-60ft high. (15 + 60) / 2= 37.5 ft > 1,143 cm    http://www.ask.com/question/what-is-the-average-height-of-a-school-flag-pole

There are 2686 YMCA camps in the U.S.  

estimated flagpole radius = 3.75 cm

estimated crayfish volume = 4.71 cm^3

volume of flagpole = 50,292 cm^3

Estimate that a crayfish is 6cm high and has a width of .5 cm. 

v=pi*r^2 h 

.5^2 cm = .25cm

3.14*.25cm*6cm= 4.71 cm^3

Estimated volume of crayfish: 4.71 cm^3

And to estimate the number of flagpoles in the U.S.

There are 98706 public schools in America. 1 flagpole/school=98706 flagpoles

there are 2686 YMCA camps. 1 flagpole/YMCA camp=2686 flagpoles

U.S. population= 316,800,000

assuming 1 in 7 people have a flag in their home, we would go 

316,800,000*.14= 44352000

1/7 = .14

98706 + 2686 + 44352000 = 44453392 flagpoles in america

f / c = x

f = volume of flagpole (cm^3)

c = volume of crayfish (cm^3)

x = crayfish/flagpole 

50,292/4.71= 4700.186916→ 4700.2 crayfish/flagpole

5.0300/4.70

5.03x10^4 flagpoles/4.7x10^2 crayfish= 1.1x10^2crayfish/flagpole

In order to find the number of crayfish per flagpole, we have to divide the volume of the flagpole by the volume of the crayfish. 

But that’s not the question we’re trying to answer:

We now need to multiply the number of crayfish/flagpole times the number of flagpoles in the U.S. This will tell us our answer. 

r * n = z

r = crayfish/flagpole 

n = number of flagpoles in U.S.

z = number of crayfish it takes to fill up all of U.S.’s flagpoles. 

4700.2 * 44453392 = 208,939,833,078

converting feet to cm

37.5 ft  (30.48cm/1 ft) = 1143 cm- height of flagpole

to find the volume of the flagpole, (v = pi r^2 h)  we go 

3.14 (3.75^2ft) 1143cm = 50292 cm^3 → volume of average flagpole 

r * n = z

r = crayfish/flagpole 

n = number of flagpoles in U.S.

z = number of crayfish it takes to fill up all of U.S.’s flagpoles. 

4700.2 crayfish/flagpole * 44453392 total flagpoles in U.S.= 208,939,833,078 crayfish fill up all of America’s flagpoles. 

We’ll round that to 209000000000

2.09*10^11 crayfish fill up all of America’s USA flagpoles. 

It would take about 209,000,000,000 crayfish to fill up all of America’s USA flagpoles. 

It would take 209 billion crayfish to fill up all of America’s USA flagpoles. 

I estimated the volume of a flagpole. I estimated the volume of a crayfish. I divided the volume of the flagpole by the volume of the crayfish. I estimated the number of flagpoles in America. I multiplied the number of crayfish/flagpole by the number of flagpoles in the USA and got my answer. To put that into perspective, it cost NASA about $209 billion to launch/prepare its space shuttle.