Question

The floor of storage unit is 5 meters long and 2 meters wide. Starting at the far left corner, Paula walks down the length, across the width, and then diagonally back to the far left corner. How far does Paula walk? If necessary, round to the nearest tenth.

Answer 1

≈ 5.4m

Explanation:

a^2 + b^2 = c^2

5^2 + 2^2 = c^2

29 = c^2

c ≈ 5.3852m

Answer 2

12.4 meters

Explanation:

We do have to use Pythagorean Theorem to get the diagonal part... But we are not done after that. It wants to know how far we have walked after going down the length, the width, and the diagonal. We are going to have to add 3 numbers at the end (3 measurements for the things I just mentioned)

5^2+2^2=c^2

25+4=c^2

29=c^2

c=sqrt(29) approx 5.4

So now we do 5+2+5.4 which is 12.4 meters