One question that stumped me this week was a word problem based on finding a missing angle in the equation. At first, I thought that the 400 m would be thy hypotenuse. When I was informed that it was the horizantal of the mine shaft (the ground) , then I figured out that I needed to use tangeant to solve. Which in the end gave me 130 degrees as the answer.

Word Problems

Key words:

Angle of depression- The line starts at the horizantal and goes down

Angle of elevation- The line starts at the horizantal and goes up

These terms helped me identify in a word problem which side I needed to use in the equations.