Steve is turning half of his backyard into a chicken pen. His backyard is a 24 meter by 45 meter rectangle. He wants to put a chicken wire fence that stretches diagonally from one corner to the opposite corner.
How many meters of fencing will Steve need?
By the Pythagorean theorem, we know that the length of the diagonal is the square root of the sum of the squares of the sides of the rectangle. Therefore,
diagonal = sqrt ((24^2) + (45^2))
diagonal = sqrt (576 + 2025)
diagonal = sqrt (2601)
diagonal = 51
So, Steve will need 51 meters of fencing to stretch diagonally from one corner to the opposite corner.