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A 3-foot-tall mailbox casts a shadow that is 1.8 feet long. At the same time, a nearby street lamp casts a shadow that is 12 feet long. How tall is the street lamp?

 Mar 30, 2020
 #1
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Imagine two right triangles. They are similar because the sun shines at the same angle or the problem wouldn't make sense with the info given.

 

1. shadowheight=shadowheight

 

2. 1.83=12x

 

3. Solve for x

 

 

Super-hard-impossible bonus question:

Given the information in the problem.

 

If you were able to stand on top of the mail box and look STRAIGHT up into the sky, the sky can represent a 2D coordinate plane. Where would the Sun be located in (x,y)?

 

Consider everything you know (sorry physicists)!

 Mar 30, 2020

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