Question

Tammy is erecting an antenna that is 55’ tall. The guy wires are 65' long and attach 5’ below the top of the antenna. How far out from the base of the antenna should Tammy place the stakes that attach to the wires

Answer 1

Let us sketch out the figure representing the word problem

So, to obtain the value of x, the image above will be restructured and we will apply the method of Pythagoras theorem to obtain x.

Therefore, the formula for the Pythagoras theorem is,

$\begin{gathered} a^2=b^2+c^2 \\ \text{where,} \\ a=65^{\prime} \\ b=50^{\prime} \\ c=x \end{gathered}$

Hence,

$\begin{gathered} 65^2=50^2+x^2 \\ x=\sqrt[]{65^2-50^2} \\ x=\sqrt[]{4225-2500}=\sqrt[]{1725}=41.53311931\approx41.5(nearest\text{ tenth)} \\ \therefore x=41.5^{\prime} \end{gathered}$

Therefore, the base of the stakes that Tammy will attach to the wires should be 41.5'.