Town A is 9 miles from town B, and 12 miles from town C. The three towns are NOT collinear (you can’t draw a single straight line through all 3 towns) A road connects towns B and C directly. Find the length of this road.

Question

anonymous · Answer

there is not enough information in this to know the distance from B to C

anonymous · Answer

essentially they are talking about a triangle in which we know 2 sides, in order to know the third side, we need an angle

anonymous · Answer

well that is all that is on the question

anonymous · Answer

is there a picture?

anonymous · Answer

no

anonymous · Answer

well then the answer is anywhere between 3 and 21 miles (not including 3 and 21 as those would be collinear lengths)

anonymous · Answer

if the AC and AB roads connected at a right angle we would at least be able to use the Pythagorean theorem...

anonymous · Answer

what have you been working on in class?  that could tell us what you are supposed to use

anonymous · Answer

oh sorry umm the pythagrean thyrum

anonymous · Answer

oh, then that easy, lets call teh length of the BC road X

9^2+12^2=X^2
81+144=X^2
225=X^2

take the square root

sqrt(225)=X

15=X

anonymous · Answer

thnks, i had to post this 3 times this hour to get THIS ONE answer

anonymous · Answer

a lot of people wont answer if they think the problem is impossible, which this is without the right angle stuff

anonymous · Answer

or evven for som1 2 say. their isnt enough info

anonymous · Answer

well thanks anyway

anonymous · Answer

glad to help ^^