The food drop for the 2018 Yukon Quest took place on the weekend. CBC did a report "What's in Your Bag." It provides a good overview.
We took some photos to give you a better idea of the supplies required to run the quest. The slideshow below tells the story – Mushers get their supplies organized – double checking to ensure they have everything; they pull into the food drop area; volunteers help unload the trucks making sure the bags go to the right checkpoint location; notice each checkpoint has a color on the sign; corresponding tags are attached to the bags; mushers double check to make sure everything is correct; then the bags are loaded into the bin or wrapped in plastic – ready to be loaded and transported to the checkpoints.
How about a bit of math using the food drop?
- There were 9 teams that dropped off 352 bags of supplies in Whitehorse. On average, how many bags per musher?
- If you use that average, and there are 26 teams running the Yukon Quest, how many bags were dropped off total?
- The maximum weight per bag is 18 kilograms (40 pounds). What's the maximum weight of all the bags dropped off?
- Find something that weighs about the same as the total supplies for each musher.
- Use google maps to determine the distance between Whitehorse to Dawson. How far did the supplies travel? Do the same for Fairbanks to Dawson?
I'm sure you can come up with more questions. If you have a good one, send it in to us and we'll add it.