Europeans should try to stay indoors if ash from Iceland's volcano starts settling, the World Health Organization warned Friday as small amounts fell in Iceland, Scotland and Norway.

WHO spokesman Daniel Epstein said the microscopic(微小的) ash is potentially dangerous for people when it starts to reach the Earth because inhaled(吸入) particles can enter the lungs and cause respiratory problems. And he also said Europeans who go outside might want to consider wearing a mask.

Other experts, however, weren't convinced the volcanic ash would have a major effect on peoples' health and said WHO's warnings were "hysterical." They said volcanic ash was much less dangerous than cigarette smoke or pollution. Volcanic ash is made of fine particles of fragmented volcanic rock. It is light gray to black and can be as fine as talcum powder. During a volcanic eruption, the ash can be breathed deep into the lungs and cause irritation even in healthy people. But once it falls from a greater distance — like from the cloud currently hovering above Europe — its health effects are often minimal, experts say.

"Not all particles are created equal," said Ken Donaldson, a professor of respiratory toxicology at the University of Edinburgh, "In the great scheme of things, volcanic ash is not all that harmful." And he said most Europeans' exposure to volcanic ash would be negligible and that only those in the near districts of the Icelandic volcano would likely be at risk.

Dr. Stephen Spiro, a professor of respiratory medicine and deputy chair of the British Lung Foundation, said the further the particles travel, the less dangerous they will be. "The cloud has already passed over northern Scotland and we haven't heard of any ill effects there," he said. Spiro said to wear masks or stay indoors to avoid volcanic ash was "over the top" and "a bit hysterical."

1. The text is mainly about         .

A. the effect of volcanic ash  

 B. the health risk of volcanic ash

 C. the disadvantages of volcanic ash

D. the opinions on health risk of volcanic ash

2. Which one is true according to Paragraph3?

A. The volcanic ash’s effects on Europeans were little.

B. The ash caused irritation even in healthy people.

 C. Other experts thought WTO’S warnings were useful.

D. The volcanic ash was more dangerous than cigarette smoke or pollution.

3. The underlined word “hysterical” in Paragraph4 most probably means        .

A. amazing          B. practical        C. valuable            D. overstated

4. What can we learn from the passage?

    A. The volcanic ash wouldn’t be harmful to people.

B. All experts thought the volcanic ash did great harm to our health.

C. People close to the volcano would likely be at risk according to some experts.   

D. Europeans should stay indoors because Iceland's volcano starts settling.

 

【答案】

 

 

 D

 A

 D

 C

【解析】

 

練習冊系列答案
相關習題

科目:高中英語 來源: 題型:閱讀理解

The devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina is a wake-up call. It is a call for every American to pay attention to the destruction we risk by allowing human-induced(導致的) climate change to continue. It is impossible to prove that Hurricane Katrina was caused by global warming, or even that human activities made the storm more severe. However, a paper published in the scholarly journal Nature reports that the force of dangerous hurricanes has increased by 50% during the last 50 years. It also reports that a global warming-induced rise in temperature near the ocean’s surface has probably contributed to this increase in dangerous storms, and thus to property(財產(chǎn)) damage and human death.

On August 30, the Los Angeles Times summed up(總結(jié)) the view of many scientists who agree that if the frequency of hurricanes does not decrease in the next few years, then we will be fairly certain that humans, and not natural storm cycle, are at the root of the problem. I believe there is at least a chance that by reducing U.S. reliance on fossil fuels for energy, we can prevent future tragedies like Hurricane Katrina. Let the change begin now.

There are many ways to reduce the volume of greenhouse gas emissions. My family drives the most fuel-efficient car we can afford, but I prefer to take public transportation whenever possible. My family buys locally grown food instead of produce that was transported thousands of miles on fuel-burning vehicles. We also replaced our incandescent light bulbs(白熾燈泡)with more energy-efficient compact fluorescents(熒光燈). This might sound like a trivial move, but the Union of Concerned Scientists reports that if every household in the United States replaced one incandescent bulb with a compact fluorescent, it would have the same effect on U.S. carbon-dioxide emissions as removing 7.5 million cars from the roads. Now think if every household replaced not just one but all of their incandescent bulbs!

The United States, with just five percent of the world’s population, is responsible for close to one quarter of greenhouse gas emissions worldwide, yet our country is doing far less than most European nations to fight global warming. We don’t have to sacrifice our lifestyles; Europeans enjoy the same standards of living as Americans. So what are we waiting for? It is time to act.

Which of the following is a fact?

A. Hurricane Katrina was caused by global warming.

B. Human activities made the storm more severe.

C. The force of dangerous hurricanes has increased by 50 percent during the last 50 years.

D. A global rise in temperature near the ocean’s surface accounts for more dangerous storms.

From Paragraph 2 we can infer that many scientists agree ________.

A. it might be human activities that lead to global warming.

B. natural storm cycles have caused global warming.

C. hurricanes are likely to come more frequently.

D. burning fossil fuels for energy is a better alternative.

If every household in the U.S. replaced all their incandescent bulbs, ________.

A. it would have the same effect as removing 7.5 million cars from the roads.

B. it would save 7.5 million tons of carbon-dioxide from going into the air.

C. this would reduce the total output of CO??emissions in huge amounts.

D. cars will be much more environmentally friendly.

According to the writer,_______in reducing the volume of greenhouse gas emissions.

A. Europe does a better job.   

B. Europe should follow the example of America.

C. he, as an European, wants to see more efforts made by Americans.

D. Europeans should shoulder a greater responsibility.

查看答案和解析>>

科目:高中英語 來源: 題型:閱讀理解

       If the world were a village of 1,000 people it would include:

?? 584 Asians

?? 124 Africans

?? 95 Eastern and Western Europeans

?? 84 Latin Americans

?? 55 former Soviets ( including Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, and other national groups)

?? 52 North Americans

?? 6 Australians and New Zealanders

The people of the village would speak:

?? 165 Mandarin

?? 86 English

?? 83 Hindu/Urdu

?? 64 Spanish

?? 58 Russian

?? 37 Arabic

The above list covers the mother tongues of only half the village.

One-third of the people in the village are children, and only 60 are over the age of 65. Just under half of the married women in the village have access to modem equipments.

This year 28 babies will be born. Ten people will die, 3 of them for lack of food, 1 from can??cer. Two of the deaths will be of babies born within the year. With the 28 births and 10 deaths, the population of the village next year will be 1,018.

In this village of 1,000 persons, 200 people receive 75 percent of the income; another 200 re??ceive only 2 percent of the income.

About one-third have access to clean, safe drinking water.

Of the 670 adults in the village, half can not read nor write.

The village has a total yearly budget (預算), public and private, of over $3 million—$ 3,000 per person if it is distributed evenly. Of the total $3 million:

$ 181,000 goes to weapons and warfare

$ 159,000 to education

$ 132,000 to health care

These weapons are under the control of just 100 of the people. The other 900 are watching them with deep anxiety, wondering whether they can learn to get along together.

60. Which of the following is true about Mandarin according to the text?

A. Nearly one-third of Asian people speak Mandarin in the village.

B. About 8.25 per cent of the people speak Mandarin in the village.

C. About 16. 5 per cent of the people speak Mandarin in the village.

D. Nearly all the Mandarin-speaking people are from Asia in the village.

61. Which of the following problems is NOT mentioned in the text?

A. Poverty.         B. Education.       C. Environment.    D. Marriage.

62. The underlined part “have access to” (in Para. 4( means_____.

A. use        B. buy         C. produce           D. try

63. The last sentence in the text implies that most of the people long for _____.

A. a peaceful world             B. good education

C. better health care           D. a life without anxiety

查看答案和解析>>

科目:高中英語 來源:2013-2014學年安徽省桐城市高三上學期第一次月考英語試卷(解析版) 題型:閱讀理解

 In Africa, listening is a guiding principle .It’s a principle that’ been lost in the constant chat of the Western world .From my own past experience , I noticed how much faster I had to answer a question during a TV interview .It is as if we have completely lost the ability to listen .We talk and talk , and we end up frightened by silence .

Everywhere, people on the African continent write and tell stories. Even the nomads(流浪者)who still live in the Kalahari Desert are said to tell one another stories on their daylong wanderings, during which they search for roots and animals to hunt.

A number of years ago I sat down on a stone bench outside the Teatro Avenida in Maputo, Mozambique, where I worked as an artistic consultant. It was a hot day, and we were taking a break, hoping that a cool gentle wind would move past. Two old African men were sitting on that bench, but there was room for me, too. In Africa people share more than just water. Even when it comes to shade, people are generous.

I heard the two men talking about a third old man who had recently died. One of them said, “I was visiting him at his home. He started to tell me an amazing story about something that had happened to him when he was young. But it was a long story. Night came, and I decided that I should come back the next day to hear the rest. But when I arrived, he was dead.”

The man fell silent. I decided not to leave that bench until I heard how the other man would respond to what he’d heard. Finally he, too, spoke. “That’s not a good way to die—before you’ve told the end of your story.”

What separates us from animals is the fact that we are storytelling creatures and we can listen to other people’s dreams, fears, joys, sorrows, desires and defeats—and they in turn can listen to ours.

Many people make the mistake of confusing information with knowledge. They are not the same thing. Knowledge involves the interpretation of information. Knowledge involves listening.

Many words will be written on the wind and the sand, or end up in store. But the storytelling will go on until the last human being stops listening. Then we can send the great record of human out into the endless universe.

Who knows? Maybe someone is out there, willing to listen…

1.From the very beginning of the passage, we can know Europeans ________.

A. actually lose the ability to listen

B. seldom chat constantly with each other

C. feel frightened when they are alone and silent

D. tend to talk more and listen less

2. It can be inferred from the passage that if you are in Africa, you will _______.

A. suffer hot weather and lack of water      

B. be certainly helped when in trouble

C. often hear the stories told by strangers    

D. have no choice but to listen during a talk

3.According to the last three paragraphs, we can know _________.

A. no one knows exactly why Africans are willing to listen

B. information is hard to understand without interpretation

C. listening makes the difference between information and knowledge

D. the existence of humans’ recordings totally depends on the way of storytelling

4.The passage mainly talks about __________.

A. the experience of the author         

B. the art of listening in Africa

C. the importance of storytelling        

D. the life styles of Africans

 

查看答案和解析>>

科目:高中英語 來源:2012-2013學年甘肅蘭州一中高三考前沖刺模擬測試英語卷(解析版) 題型:閱讀理解

Most mornings, the line begins to form at dawn: scores of silent women with babies on their backs, buckets balanced on their heads, and in each hand a bright-blue plastic jug. On good days, they will wait less than an hour before a water tanker goes across the dirt path that serves as a road in Kesum Purbahari, a slum on the southern edge of New Delhi. On bad days, when there is no electricity for the pumps, the tankers don’t come at all. “That water kills people,” a young mother named Shoba said one recent Saturday morning, pointing to a row of pails filled with thick, caramel (焦糖)-colored liquid. “Whoever drinks it will die.” The water was from a pipe shared by thousands of people in the poor neibourhood. Women often use it to wash clothes and bathe their children, but no­body is desperate enough to drink it.

  There is no standard for how much water a person needs each day, but ex­perts usually put the minimum at fifty li­tres. The government of India promises (but rarely provides) forty. Most people drink two or three litres—less than it takes to wash a toilet. The rest is typically used for cooking and bathing. Americans consume between four hundred and six hundred litres of water each day, more than any other people on earth. Most Europeans use less than half that. The women of Kesum Purbahari each hoped to drag away a hundred litres that day—two or three buckets’ worth. Shoba has a husband and five children, and that much water doesn’t go far in a family of seven, particularly when the temperature reaches a hundred and ten degrees before noon. She often makes up the difference with bottled water, which costs more than water delivered any other way. Sometimes she just buys milk; it’s cheaper. Like the poorest people every­where, the people of New Delhi’s slums spend a far greater percentage of their incomes on water than anyone lucky enough to live in a house connected to a system of pipes.

1.The underlined word “slum” most likely means ______.

A. a village

B. a small town

C. the part of a town that lacks water badly

D. an area of a town with badly-built, over-crowded buildings

2.Sometimes the water tanker doesn’t come because ______.

A. there is no electricity             B. the weather is bad

C. there is no water            D. people don’t want the dirty water

3.A person needs at least ________ litres of water a day.

A. forty           B. four hundred         C. a hundred      D. fifty

4.The passage mainly tells us ______.

A. how India government manages to solve the problem of water gets their water

B. how women in Kesum Purbahari

C. how much water a day a person deeds

D. that India lacks water badly

 

查看答案和解析>>

科目:高中英語 來源:2015屆河北省石家莊市高一10月月考英語試卷(解析版) 題型:閱讀理解

Do you know blood types?

Special care must be taken in selecting new blood for a badly injured person, who would be killed by the transfusion (輸血) if the blood is too different from his own.

There are four basic types of blood A. B. A B. and O. Blood type, like hair and height, comes from parents. Basically, A and B can not be mixed. AB, sometimes called the universal recipient (萬能受血者), may receive A or B,. O type, often called the universal donor (萬能輸血者), gives his blood to any other group. Patients usually receive nothing, but salt or plasma (血漿) until their blood can be matched as exactly as possible in the blood bank of a hospital. There is a relationship between your blood type and your nationality (國籍). Among Europeans, about 42 % have type A while 45 % have type O. The fewest is the type B.

1.Which of the following show the correct relationship in blood transfusion ("→"means giving blood to...)?

   

A.                 B.                 C.                 D.

2.Usually person who has been injured and lost too much blood should be given a blood transfusion______.

A.a(chǎn)fter he receives salt and plasma           B.before he feels uncomfortable

C.when the new blood fits his body          D.a(chǎn)s soon as accident happens

3.From this passage we can know that among Europeans ______ 13 % have the type B.

A. about   B. no more than   C. less than   D. at most

 

查看答案和解析>>

同步練習冊答案