A tower, 200 feet high, has an elevator inside it, and a spiral stairway winding its way around the tower at a constant 30 degree angle with the horisontal.

Given the tower's radius of 10 feet, what is the difference between the distance covered by a person going up in the elevator, versus one climbing the stairs?

Richard's answer is correct.

a = 200 (height of tower)

angle is 30 degrees from the horizontal, it equals to 90 degress from the vertical.(in a right triangle whose acute angles are 30 degrees and 60 degrees the sides are in the ratio 1 : \/3 : 2, so that sin 30 degrees = cos 60 degrees = 1/2)

c = distance

therefore, a = c (cos 60 degress)
200' = c (1/2)
c = 400'

and the difference will be 200'

c =

Posted by Angela on 2002-05-07 07:23:01