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Question: geometry, again

geometry, again

A water tower is 600 ft. from an observer. A line of sight to the top of the water tank forms an angle of 28 degrees with the ground. A line of sight to the bottome of the tak forms an angle of 26 degrees. What is the distance from the bottom of the water tank to the top of the water tank? I don't necesarily want the answer, just how to answer it...I am horrible at geometry.

Date Posted: September 03, 2007 Tagged Under: geometry . mathematics . trigonometry . angles . triangles
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Im lost with ya...................................................:)

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10.0

Do they have a picture with this problem? The way I read it you would basically have to solve two separate problems and add them together to get the height of the building. ie how we worked through the previous problems because you would basically have two triangles to solve for unknowns:

first triangle would be the 28 degree triangle, which gives you theta and the adjacent and you need to solve for the opposite:
tan(theta)=x/600

second triangle would be the 26 degree triangle, which gives you theta and you need to solve for the opposite:
tan(theta)=y/600

You would then add x and y to get the total height of the water tower.

Does this make sense? The thing that I don't know is if the water tower is off the ground and both angles are with the ground, etc...either way you will have two separate triangles and you will either add or subtract the two answers. If this doesn't help give me a little more detail, ie is the 26 degrees from the ground as well?