Question

peter is trying to get his cat out of a tree in his backyard. The cat is 12feet above the ground, and Peter has to put the base of his ladder 9 feet away from the tree because of mud. How long does the ladder need to be in order to reach the cat.

Answer 1

15 feet

Explanation:

Given that,

The cat is 12feet above the ground, and Peter has to put the base of his ladder 9 feet away from the tree because of mud.

If we consider a right-angled triangle, in which the height is 12 feet, base is 9 feet.

We need to find how long does the ladder need to be in order to reach the cat i.e. the hypotenuse of the triangle.

We can use the Pythagoras theorem to find it.

`H^2=h^2+b^2\\\\H^2=12^2+9^2\\\\H^2=144+81\\\\H=√(225) \\\\H=15\ \text{feet}`

So, the ladder must be at a distance of 15 feet in order to reach the cat.