An airline ramp with a base of 50 feet makes an angle of 27° with the ground. I need to find out how long will a person walk on the ramp.

Question

mathstudent55 · Answer

I think this is what the question means. We are looking for x.
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mathstudent55 · Answer

We need the trig function that relates the adjacent leg to the hypotenuse.
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mathstudent55 · Answer

Recalling: SOHCAHTOA, we can use the cosine:

$\cos \theta = \dfrac{adj}{hyp} $

$\cos 27^o = \dfrac{50 ~ft}{x} $

$x = \dfrac{50~ft}{\cos 27^o} $

Just do the division to find x, the length of the ramp.