Bee and the Locomotives

Contributed by Eddy Nobis


There are 2 railway stations, A and B, connected by a winding dual railway track, 100km long. There is a locomotive at each station and the locomotive at station A has a bee on it, asleep in the sunshine. At precisely the same time both locomotives start up and head off toward the other station. The blast of the engine wakes the bee and frightens it, so it zooms off up the track at it's top speed of 90km/h. The locomotives themselves only travel at 50km/h so the bee gets clear and zooms away until it suddenly comes across the other locomotive coming the other way which scares the hell out of it and it turns around and flies back the way it came. Until it once again comes across the first locomotive still puffing along, at which point the bee turns around again and flies back until it meets the other approaching locomotive, etc. Until finally the bee finds itself imminently threatened on both sides by the locomotives and, not understanding the fact that they each have their own track, it thinks that it is about to be squashed and expires of fright.

How many kilometers did the bee travel during this episode?


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