Question

You need a ladder that will reach up to 25 foot tall house when placed 10 feet away from the house. How tall does the ladder need to be ?

Answer 1

This creates a right triangle. One leg of the triangle is 25 feet and the other is 10 feet. To find the length of the ladder, we must use Pythagorean theorem.

a = 25

b = 10

c = ?

(25)^2 + (10)^2 = c^2. Square all the terms to the left of the equation and add them together.

725 = c^2. Take the square root of each side.

c = 26.93 feet.

The ladder needs to be 26.93 feet tall.