A ladder is 13.0m long. It leans against the wall. The base of the ladder is 3.7m from the wall. What is the angle of inclination of the ladder to the nearest tenth of a degree?

2 answers

now wait a minute, time to learn this stuff:

In a right triangle:

sin theta = opposite / hypotenuse
cos theta = adjacent / hypotenuse
tan theta = opposite / adjacent

so here we have
hypotenuse is ladder, 13
adjacent = along ground = 3.7
so
cos theta = 3.7/13
74