Question

A building is 2ft from a 7 ft fence that surrounds the property. A worker wants to wash a window in the building 11ft from the ground. He plans to place a ladder over the fence so it rests against the building. He decides he should place the ladder 7ft from the fence for stability. How long of a ladder will he need?

Answer 1

Explanation:

plug the numbers into the Pythagorean theorem

which is A^2 + B^2 = C^2

Answer 2

The ladder is approx 14.21 feet long.

Explanation:

The base of the ladder is 7 feet from the fence, which is 2 feet from the building, so it will be 9 feet from the building.

The top of the ladder will reach the window which is 11 feet from the ground.

In this way, we get a right triangle with the ladder as the hypotenuse, that we have to find.

Let the hypotenuse be x.

Using the Pythagorean Theorem, we get;

`9^(2) +11^(2) =x^(2)`

=>
`81+121=x^(2)`

=>
`202=x^(2)`

=>
`x=√(202)`

=> x = 14.21

Hence, the ladder is approx 14.21 feet long.