Question

A guy wire is used to stabilize a utility pole. The wire is fastened to the pole 25 feet above the ground, and staked into the ground 4 feet from the base of the pole. (No stand-offs are used, the wire goes directly from the pole to the ground stake.) Someone recommends that more stability could be achieved by moving the ground stake out to 6 feet from the pole.

a. How long is the guy wire with the present arrangement?
b. How much longer would the guy wire have to be with the proposed arrangement?

Answer 1

a) So you're looking at a Right Angled Triangle (RAT) with the two short sides being 4 and 25. What does Pythagoras say about the other side, which must be the hypotenuse?

b) This is the same question, except with 6 on the shortest side instead of 4.

Answer 2

twenty feet

Answer 3

4545