Problem: A straight river that is $264$ meters wide flows from west to east at a rate of $14$ meters per minute. Melanie and Sherry sit on the south bank of the river with Melanie a distance of $D$ meters downstream from Sherry. Relative to the water, Melanie swims at $80$ meters per minute, and Sherry swims at $60$ meters per minute. At the same time, Melanie and Sherry begin swimming in straight lines to a point on the north bank of the river that is equidistant from their starting positions. The two women arrive at this point simultaneously. Find $D$

Solution: We can break down movement into two components: the $x$ -component and the $y$ -component. Suppose that Melanie travels a distance of $a$ in the $x$ -direction and a distance of $c$ in the $y$ -direction in one minute when there is no current. Similarly, suppose that Sherry travels a distance of $a$ in the $x$ -direction but a distance of $b$ in the $y$ -direction in one minute when there is no current. The current only affects the $x$ -components because it goes in the $x$ -direction.
[asy] /* Ruthlessly plagiarized from MRENTHUSIASM by Curious_crow */ size(350); pair A, B, C; A = (0,264); B = (-275,0); C = (275,0); draw((-300,0)--(300,0)^^(-300,264)--(300,264)^^A--B^^A--C,linewidth(2)); dot("Finish",A,1.75*N,linewidth(5)); dot("Sherry",B,1.75*S,linewidth(5)); dot("Melanie",C,1.75*S,linewidth(5)); Label L1 = Label("$D$", align=(0,0), position=MidPoint, filltype=Fill(3,0,white)); Label L2 = Label("$264$", align=(0,0), position=MidPoint, filltype=Fill(0,3,white)); Label L3 = Label("Current $(14)$", position=EndPoint, filltype=Fill(3,0,white)); Label L4 = Label("$a$", align=(-1,0), position=Relative(0.4)); Label L5 = Label("$b+14$", align=(0,1), position=Relative(0.4)); Label L6 = Label("$a$", align=(1,0), position=Relative(0.4)); Label L7 = Label("$c-14$", align=(0,1), position=Relative(0.4)); draw(B-(0,75)--C-(0,75), L=L1, arrow=Arrows(),bar=Bars(15)); draw((-350,0)--(-350,264), L=L2, arrow=Arrows(),bar=Bars(15)); draw((-300,-120)--(300,-120), L=L3, arrow=EndArrow()); draw(B--B+(0,48), L=L4, arrow=EndArrow()); draw(B+(0,48)--B+(50,48), L=L5, arrow=EndArrow()); draw(C--C+(0,48), L=L6, arrow=EndArrow()); draw(C+(0,48)--C+(-50,48), L=L7, arrow=EndArrow()); [/asy]
Now, note that $a^2 + b^2 = 60^2$ because Sherry travels 60 meters in a minute. Thus, $a^2 + c^2 = 80^2$ because Melanie travels 80 meters in a minute. Also, the distance they travel with the current must be the same in one minute because they reach the point equidistant from them at the same time. That means $b + 14 = c - 14$ or $b = c - 28$ . So now we can plug that into the two equations to get: \begin{align*} a^2 + c^2 &= 80^2, \\ a^2 + (c-28)^2 &= 60^2. \end{align*} We can solve the system of equations to get $a = 48$ and $c = 64$ . From this, we can figure out that it must've taken them $5.5$ minutes to get to the other side, because $264/48 = 5.5$ . This means that there are $5.5$ lengths of $48$ in each person's travel. Also, $D$ must be equal to $11(b+14) = 11(c-14)$ because there are $(5.5)2 = 11$ lengths of $b-14$ between them, $5.5$ on each person's side. Since $c = 64$ , we have $c-14 = 50$ , so the answer is \[D=11\cdot50=\boxed{550}.\] ~Curious_crow

Answer:  550