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Aladder leaning against a building makes an angle of 52° with the ground and reaches a point on the building 20 feet

above the ground. What is the length of the ladder to the nearest foot?
A) 24 ft
B)25 ft
C)23 ft
D)21 ft
E)30 ft

1 Answer

1 vote

Final answer:

To find the length of the ladder, we can use trigonometry. In this case, the ladder acts as the hypotenuse of a right triangle, with the ground and the building forming the other two sides. The length of the ladder to the nearest foot is 25 ft.

Step-by-step explanation:

To find the length of the ladder, we can use trigonometry. In this case, the ladder acts as the hypotenuse of a right triangle, with the ground and the building forming the other two sides. Since we know the angle and the length of one of the sides (the height of the building), we can use the sine function to find the length of the ladder.

Let x be the length of the ladder. We have sin(52°) = 20/x. Cross multiplying, we get x sin(52°) = 20. Dividing both sides by sin(52°), we find x = 20/sin(52°) ≈ 25 feet.

Therefore, the length of the ladder to the nearest foot is 25 ft. So, the correct answer is B) 25 ft.

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