Question

Suppose that two people standing 2 miles apart both see the burst from a fireworks display. After a period of​ time, the first person standing at point A hears the burst. Six seconds ​later, the second person standing at point B hears the burst. If the person at point B is due west of the person at point A and if the display is known to occur due north of the person at point​ A, where did the fireworks display​ occur? Note that sound travels at 1100 feet per second.

Answer 1

Answer: approximately 5148 feet directly north of point A

This is equivalent to 0.975 miles

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Explanation:

Check out figure 1 (attached image below) to see how the drawing is set up.

Points A and B are separated by 2 miles, or 10560 feet. Use the conversion factor 1 mile = 5280 feet.

Because sound travels at roughly 1100 feet per second (assuming all of the conditions are right), this means that after x seconds, the sound wave has traveled a total distance of 1100x feet. This is the distance from A to C. Point C is the firework location.

The distance from B to C is 1100(x+6) feet because it takes 6 more seconds for the soundwave to travel from C to B, compared from C to A.

Note that triangle ABC is a right triangle. The 90 degree angle is at point A.

We can use the pythagorean theorem to solve for x

See figure 2 in the attached images to see the steps on solving for x. The numbers get quite big, though in the end x is fairly small. We end up with x = 4.68, which is approximate due to the 1100 figure being approximate.

This means the sound wave takes about 4.68 seconds to go from point C to point A.

With this x value, we can compute the expression 1100x to get

1100*x = 1100*4.68 = 5,148 feet

To convert this to miles, divide by 5280

(5148)/(5280) = 0.975

Therefore,

5148 feet = 0.975 miles