Question

Chicago, Illinois, has a longitude of 88W and a latitude of 42N. Indianaplis, Indiana, is located at 86W and 40N. At this longitiude/latitude each degree is about 53 miles. Find the distance between Chicago Indianapolis

Answer 1

To find the distance between Chicago and Indianapolis, convert the longitude and latitude coordinates to decimal form and use the distance formula for two points in a coordinate plane.

Step-by-step explanation:

The distance between two points on the Earth's surface can be found using the formula for distance between two points in a coordinate plane. In this case, we can use the longitude and latitude coordinates of Chicago and Indianapolis to calculate the distance between them.

Step 1: Convert the longitude and latitude coordinates to decimal form. Chicago's longitude of 88W becomes -88, and Indianapolis' longitude of 86W becomes -86. Chicago's latitude of 42N becomes 42, and Indianapolis' latitude of 40N becomes 40.

Step 2: Use the formula: distance = √((x2 - x1)² + (y2 - y1)²). In this formula, x1 and y1 represent the longitude and latitude coordinates of Chicago, and x2 and y2 represent the longitude and latitude coordinates of Indianapolis.

Step 3: Calculate the distance using the formula. Substitute the values into the formula and simplify to find the distance between Chicago and Indianapolis.