Question

A utility pole 10m high is supported by two guy wires. Each guy wire is anchored 3m from the base of the pole. How many meters of wire is needed for the guy wires?

Answer 1

you can use Pythagorean theorem to solve

10 squared + 3 squared = x squared
100+9=x squared
109=x squared
square route 109 and x to get
10.44=x

Answer 2

The wire is around 10.4 meters long.

Explanation:

This problem models a right triangle, where the legs are the height of the pole, and the horizontal distance from each guy to the base of the pole, the hypothenuse is the wire.

So, basically the problem is asking for the length of the hypothenuses, this means we can use the pythagorean theorem to find it

`a^(2)=b^(2) +c^(2)`

Where
`a` represents the length of the wire,
`b` represents the height of the pole and
`c` represents the horizontal distance between the guy wire and the base of the pole.

According to the problem
`b=10` and
`c=3`, replacing these values, we have

`a^(2)=10^(2) +3^(2)=109\\a=√(109)\approx 10.4`

Therefore, the wire is around 10.4 meters long.