A 10-meter vertical pole casts a shadow of 10 square roor of 3 meters. What is the angle of elevation of the sun from the ground?

Answer 1

The shadow creates a second side of a right triangle. Opposite side = 10 adjacent side = 10sqr3

tangent of the angle of elevation is 10/10sqr3 = 1/sqr3 = sqr3/3 = about 1.732/3 = 0.577

Let x = the angle

tanx=0.577

x = tan^-1(0.577) use a calculator with inverse tangent function

x = 30 degrees = pi/6 radians

The distance from the top of the 10 meter pole to the end of the shadow cast is 20 meters.

this is a common right triangle for 30 degrees with sides 1, sqr3, and 2. Multiply each of those numbers by 10. then the pole is 10 meters, shadow is 10 times sqr3 and distance from pole top to shadow end is 20 meters.