Orville walks 330 m due east. He then continues walking along a straight line, but in a different direction, and stops 160 m northeast of his starting point. How far did he walk during the second portion of the trip and in what direction?

Answer 1

use the law of cosines. The distance z is found using

z^2 = 330^2 + 160^2 - 2*330*160 cos 45°

and the direction is θ (measured from due east) where

tanθ = (160/√2)/(160/√2 - 330)