Question

Nick has a 50-foot ladder. He places the ladder 20 feet away from the base of a building. What is the distance between the base of the building and the top of the ladder, x , to the nearest foot?

Answer 1

54

Explanation:

the ladder and distance to the building are like the sides of a right angled triangle. therefore you can apply the pythagoras theorem to find the length of the hypotenuse ( side a ), or the distance from the base of the building to the top of the ladder

a²=b²+c²

a = x

b = 20

c = 50

a² = 20² + 50²

a² = 2900

`√(2900) = a`

a = 53.85

a= 54 (nearest whole number)