A bird is perched on a light pole that is 13 feet tall. You spot the bird as you’re walking across the street. If you are 5 feet tall, and the diagonal distance from you to the bird is 10 feet, what is the angle of elevation you are using to look at the bird? Use the inverse of sine to find your answer and round to the nearest whole degree.(1 point)

Question

A bird is perched on a light pole that is 13 feet tall. You spot the bird as you’re walking across the street. If you are 5 feet tall, and the diagonal distance from you to the bird is 10 feet, what is the angle of elevation you are using to look at the bird? Use the inverse of sine to find your answer and round to the nearest whole degree.(1 point)

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Answer 1

To find the angle of elevation, we can use the formula:

sin(angle) = opposite/hypotenuse

In this case, the opposite side is the height of the light pole (13 feet) and the hypotenuse is the diagonal distance from you to the bird (10 feet). We are looking for the angle of elevation so we will use the inverse sine function to solve for the angle:

angle = sin^(-1) (opposite/hypotenuse)
angle = sin^(-1) (13/10)
angle ≈ sin^(-1) (1.3)

Using a calculator, we get:

angle ≈ 54.5 degrees

Therefore, the angle of elevation you are using to look at the bird is approximately 54 degrees.