Question

A building is 2 ft from a 7 - ft fence that surrounds the property . A worker wants to wash a window in the building 11 ft from the ground . He plans to place a ladder over the fence so it rests against the building . (See the figure .) He decides he should place the ladder 7 ft from the fence for stability . To the nearest tenth of a foot , how long a ladder will he need ?

Answer 1

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;

Hence, the ladder is approx 14.21 feet long.