Question

A 10-foot ladder is placed against the side of a brick wall as shown in figure 1. The bottom of the ladder is 8 feet from the base of the wall. How high up the wall does the ladder reach?

Answer 1

6 ft.

Explanation:

Because it would be a triangle, the hypotenuse is 10 ft. (the ladder), the base is 8 ft. (the ladder is 8 ft. from the base) and so we must make an equation to find the height. The equation is

`10^(2)-8^(2) =Height`

Once we solve we find 100-64=36. The square root of 36 is 6. Hope this helps!