There are five planes ready for departure at an airport. The number of passengers on each plane is displayed in Table 11.18. Each plane requires 10 minutes to taxi to the runway and 2 minutes to take off (i.e., there needs to be 2 minutes between departures). If the air traffic controller wants to minimize the weighted average number of passengers waiting for departure (i.e., weighted by the number of passengers on the plane), in what sequence should the planes take off?

a. A, B, C, D, E
b. B, A, D, E, C
c. C, B, E, A, D
d. C, E, D, A, B
e. It doesn’t matter what sequence they depart in because they have equal processing times.

TABLE 11.18 Number of Passengers on Five Planes Ready for Departure Plane Passengers A 150 B 50 C 400 D 200 E 250