The+Horizon

=The Horizon = = = == Group Members: Jocelynn Ritchey, Brett Wisse, Joe Welk, Lindsey Hammond Period 7: Rachor

The Problem: If you were in a plane at an elevation of 1000 feet above the earth, determine the distance to the horizon. With what angle would you be looking at the horizon relative to your position directly above the ground?

In order to solve the problem you need to have the prior knowledge that the radius of the earth is 20903520. Once you have that you should set up a picture like the one you can find above when you click on "horizon problem.bmp" With this you can see that you have one side of the triangle as the radius, another side as the radius plus the 1000 feet that the plane is in the air. The missing side is the one you are trying to find and that would be the distance to the horizon. From this you use the pythagorean theorem which is the main and in reality only use of trigonometry in this problem.

20,904,520^2=20,903,520^2+b^2

4.369989564E^10=4.36957144E^10+b^2

4.1808E^10=b^2

204,470=b

The distance to the horizon is 204,470 feet or 38.72 miles.