Joel is laying pipe for a sprinkler system before he plants his lawn. The lawn is a rectangle, 15 feet long and 8 feet wide. He needs to lay a piece of pipe that will run along the diagonal of the lawn. It will divide the area of the lawn into two right triangles. What will be the length of the pipe?

Question

Question 3 options:

A)

120 feet

B)

23 feet

C)

17 feet

D)

289 feet

Answer 1

To find the length of the pipe that will run along the diagonal of the rectangular lawn, we can use the Pythagorean theorem.

Let:

• \( a = 15 \) feet (length of the lawn)
• \( b = 8 \) feet (width of the lawn)

The length of the diagonal \( d \) can be calculated using the formula:

\[ d = \sqrt{a^2 + b^2} \]

Substituting the values:

\[ d = \sqrt{15^2 + 8^2} \] \[ d = \sqrt{225 + 64} \] \[ d = \sqrt{289} \] \[ d = 17 \text{ feet} \]

Thus, the length of the pipe that Joel needs to lay is 17 feet.

The correct answer is:

C) 17 feet