• Question: what is a light year?

    Asked by zaraa to Bob, Katie, Nisha, Sallie, Vee on 27 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Sallie Baxendale

      Sallie Baxendale answered on 27 Jun 2012:

      Light travels at 186,000 miles per second. A light year is the distance that light can travel in a year, so it’s

      186,000 miles/second x 60 seconds/minute x 60 minutes/hour x 24 hours/day x 365 days/year = 5,865,696,000,000 miles/year

      that works out to be 5,865,696,000,000 miles.

    • Photo: Vee Mitchell

      Vee Mitchell answered on 27 Jun 2012:

      The distance travelled by light in a year – estimated at approximately 6 trillion miles.

    • Photo: Bob Bonwick

      Bob Bonwick answered on 3 Jul 2012:

      The distance light travels in one year, as light moves a 186,000 miles per second it is a very long way. If we ever get to travel at those speeds, the length of time it takes to get up to that speed would have to be a long time otherwise our bodies would be turned into jam!

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