Question

X

An airplane climbs at an angle of
16° with the ground. Find the
ground distance the plane travels
as it moves 2500 m through the
air.
Help me

Answer 1

`2403\:\mathrm{m}`

Explanation:

We can form a right triangle and use trigonometry for a right triangle to solve this. The ground distance the plane travels is its displacement in the x-direction. The 2500 meters the plane moves through represents the hypotenuse of right triangle, and the ground distance is the adjacent leg of the
`16^(\circ)` angle. Therefore, we set up the following equation:

`\cos 16^(\circ)=(x)/(2500)`, where
`x` is the ground distance.

Solving, we get
`x=2500\cdot \cos 16^(\circ) \approx \fbox{$2403\:\mathrm{m}$}`.