Question

The shadow of a 60 m long vertical pole is of 10 m. Then what will be the angle of inclination ? Round your answer to the nearest tenth of a degree .

Answer 1

Answer:

Explanation:

Angles of elevation and depression are always measured from the horizontal.

This means that, at a point at the end of the tree's shadow there is as angle of 60 degrees between the ground and a line to the top of the tree, which is 50m tall.

We assume the tree is vertical, giving a right-angled triangle.

If the length of the shadow is

x

m, then we have the trig ratio using the opposite and the adjacent sides:

50

x

=

tan

60

°

Having the variable in the denominator is not a good idea.

We can change the equation into two different forms:

From

50

x

=

tan

60

°

1

, we can get

x

50

=

1

tan

60

°

Or from

50

x

=

tan

60

°

, we can get

50

=

x

×

tan

60

°

Both of these lead to the calculation for

x

as

x

=

50

tan

60

°

x

=

28.87

m