A 35 foot wire is secured the top of a flagpole to a stake in the ground. If the stake is 14 feet from the base of the flagpole, how tall is the flagpole?

Question

I need to find out how to setup and solve the question. It is the converse of pythagorean theorem.

Answer 1

Hi Somalia,

 

So we have a triangle here.

 

The 35 foot wire is your hypotenuse

14 feet to the stake is one of your legs.

 

Pythagorean theorem is a² + b² = c² 

where a and b are the legs and c is the hypotenuse

 

This gives us

 

14² + b² = 35²

196 + b² = 1225

b² = 1029

b = 32.078 feet