Question

A man drove 13 mi directly east from his home, made a left turn at an intersection, and then traveled 5 mi north to his place of work. If a road was made directly from his home to his place of work, what would its distance be to the nearest tenth of a mile?

Answer 1

13.93 miles

Explanation:

From the given information:

we are being told that a drove 13 miles towards east from home.

and make a left turn due north, thus travel 5 miles.

The objective is to find the man's distance from his starting point(i.e. his home) to his place of work.

Let the horizontal base distance be x = adjacent side = 13 miles

Let the vertical distance be y = opposite side = 5 miles

Let the slant distance be z = hypotenuse side = ??? (unknown)

Therefore, using the pythagoras theorem.

(hypotenuse)² = (opposite)² + (adjacent)²

z² = y² + x²

z² = 5² + 13²

z² = 25 + 169

z² = 194

`z = √(194)`

z = 13.93 miles