A person who is 6 feet tall walks away from a 50-foot silo toward the tip of the silo's shadow. At a distance of 32 feet from the silo, the person's shadow begins to emerge beyond the silo's shadow. How much farther must the person walk to be completely out of the silo's shadow?
need help w/ distance to walk to be out of silo's shadow
- Thread starter lake
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Draw the right triangle formed by the ground (the base), the near side of the silo (h = 50), and the "top" of the shadow (the hypotenuse).lake said:
When the person's shadow reaches the far end of the silo's shadow, you then have a nested right triangle. This triangle is formed by the ground (the base), the person's height (h = 6), and the "top" of the person's shadow (the hypotenuse).
Since the person is thirty-two feet from the near side of the silo, what is the distance, along the ground (along the base of the larger triangle) between the base of the silo and the person's feet? Label your drawing with this value.
Since the right triangles are nested, they are clearly similar. Label the person's shadow length as, say, "x". Then what is the length of the base of the larger triangle?lake said:
Use similar triangles, with the base expressions and height values, to find the length of the person's (nested) shadow. This is the distance he has yet to walk.
If you get stuck, please reply showing (or describing) what you tried and how far you got. Thank you!
Eliz.