When converting 0.6 (from 45° 24.6"), what do you multiply by 60 to find seconds?

To determine the correct value to multiply by 60 when converting a decimal from degrees to seconds, it’s important to understand the conversion process from degrees to minutes and then from minutes to seconds.

In the given example, the decimal 0.6 represents the minutes portion of an angle measurement; here, it follows the degrees. To convert the decimal minutes into seconds, you multiply the decimal minutes by 60, since there are 60 seconds in a minute. Therefore, multiplying 0.6 (the decimal notation for minutes) by 60 gives you the number of seconds.

The calculation is straightforward:

0.6 minutes * 60 seconds/minute = 36 seconds.

Using this rationale, the correct answer is the decimal representation of the minutes, which is 0.6. The other options do not correctly represent the portion of the minutes to be converted into seconds, which is why they are less relevant for this specific calculation. Understanding this conversion is vital in various GIS applications, where precise geographic coordinate conversions are often required.