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| Math Central | Quandaries & Queries |
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Question from Fabiola, a student: A telescope is mounted on a tripod 5 ft above the ground and 20 ft from a flagpole. The telescope must be rotated 48° from horizontal to see the top of the flagpole. How tall is the flagpole? |
Hi again, Fabiola.
Here is a sketch of the question:
Thus, the height of the flag pole is 5 ft, plus the length of the triangle opposite the side you know:
Can you think of a trigonometry function that can tell you the length of the side opposite a known angle of a right triangle when you know the length of the adjacent side?
Hope this helps,
Stephen La Rocque.
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