Day_6 Reading

● Let’s Practise!Reading 1

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are basedon Reading Passage 1 below.

The megafires of CaliforniaDrought, housing expansion, and oversupply of tinder make for bigger, hotterfires in the western United States

Wildfires are becoming an increasing menace in the western United States, withSouthern California being the hardest hit area. There’s a reason fire squads battlingmore frequent blazes in Southern California are having such difficulty containing theflames, despite better preparedness than ever and decades of experience fighting firesfanned by the ‘Santa Ana Winds’. The wildfires themselves, experts say, are generallyhotter, faster, and spread more erratically than in the past.

Megafires, also called ‘siege fires’, are the increasingly frequent blazes that burn500,000 acres or more – 10 times the size of the average forest fire of 20 years ago.Some recent wildfires are among the biggest ever in California in terms of acreageburned, according to state figures and news reports.

One explanation for the trend to more superhot fires is that the region, which usuallyhas dry summers, has had significantly below normal precipitation in many recentyears. Another reason, experts say, is related to the century- long policy of the USForest Service to stop wildfires as quickly as possible.

The unintentional consequence has been to halt the natural eradication of underbrush,now the primary fuel for megafires.Three other factors contribute to the trend, theyadd. First is climate change, marked by a 1-degree Fahrenheit rise in average yearlytemperature across the western states. Second is fire seasons that on average are 78days longer than they were 20 years ago. Third is increased construction of homes inwooded areas.

‘We are increasingly building our homes in fire-prone ecosystems,’ says DominikKulakowski, adjunct professor of biology at Clark University Graduate School ofGeography in Worcester, Massachusetts. ‘Doing that in many of the forests of thewestern US is like building homes on the side of an active volcano.’

In California, where population growth has averaged more than 600,000 a year for atleast a decade, more residential housing is being built. ‘What once was open space isnow residential homes providing fuel to make fires burn with greater intensity,’ saysTerry McHale of the California Department of Forestry firefighters’ union. ‘With somuch dryness, so many communities to catch fire, so many fronts to fight, it becomesan almost incredible job.’

That said, many experts give California high marks for making progress onpreparedness in recent years, after some of the largest fires in state history scorchedthousands of acres, burned thousands of homes, and killed numerous people. Stung inthe past by criticism of bungling that allowed fires to spread when they might havebeen contained, personnel are meeting the peculiar challenges of neighborhood – andcanyon- hopping fires better than previously, observers say.

State promises to provide more up-to-date engines, planes, and helicopters to fightfires have been fulfilled. Firefighters’ unions that in the past complained of dilapidatedequipment, old fire engines, and insufficient blueprints for fire safety are now praisingthe state’s commitment, noting that funding for firefighting has increased, despite hugecuts in many other programs. ‘We are pleased that the current state administration hasbeen very proactive in its support of us, and [has] come through with budgetarysupport of the infrastructure needs we have long sought,’ says Mr. McHale of thefirefighters’ union.

Besides providing money to upgrade the fire engines that must traverse the mammothstate and wind along serpentine canyon roads, the state has invested in bettercommand-and-control facilities as well as in the strategies to run them. ‘In the firesieges of earlier years, we found that other jurisdictions and states were willing to offermutual-aid help, but we were not able to communicate adequately with them,’ saysKim Zagaris, chief of the state’s Office of Emergency Services Fire and Rescue Branch.

After a commission examined and revamped communications procedures, thestatewide response ‘has become far more professional and responsive,’ he says. Thereis a sense among both government officials and residents that the speed, dedication,and coordination of firefighters from several states and jurisdictions are resulting ingreater efficiency than in past ‘siege fire’ situations.

In recent years, the Southern California region has improved building codes, evacuationprocedures, and procurement of new technology. ‘I am extraordinarily impressed by theimprovements we have witnessed,’ says Randy Jacobs, a Southern California- basedlawyer who has had to evacuate both his home and business to escape wildfires.‘Notwithstanding all the damage that will continue to be caused by wildfires, we willno longer suffer the loss of life endured in the past because of the fire prevention andfirefighting measures that have been put in place,’ he says.

Questions 1-6

Complete the notes below.Choose ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet.

Wildfires

● Characteristics of wildfires and wildfire conditions today compared to the past:– occurrence: more frequent– temperature: hotter– speed: faster– movement: 1……………. more unpredictably– size of fires: 2……………. greater on average than two decades ago

● Reasons wildfires cause more damage today compared to the past:– rainfall: 3……………. Average– more brush to act as 4……………..– increase in yearly temperature– extended fire 5……………..– more building of 6……………. in vulnerable places

Questions 7-13

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?In boxes 7-13 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

7 The amount of open space in California has diminished over the last ten years.

8 Many experts believe California has made little progress in readying itself to fight

fires.

9 Personnel in the past have been criticised for mishandling fire containment.

10 California has replaced a range of firefighting tools.

11 More firefighters have been hired to improve fire-fighting capacity.

12 Citizens and government groups disapprove of the efforts of different states and

agencies working together.

13 Randy Jacobs believes that loss of life from fires will continue at the same levels,

despite changes made.

Reading 2

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are basedon Reading Passage 2 below.

The Falkirk WheelA unique engineering achievement

The Falkirk Wheel in Scotland is the world’s first and only rotating boat lift. Opened in2002, it is central to the ambitious £84.5m Millennium Link project to restorenavigability across Scotland by reconnecting the historic waterways of the Forth &Clyde and Union Canals.

The major challenge of the project lies in the fact that the Forth & Clyde Canal issituated 35 metres below the level of the Union Canal. Historically, the two canals hadbeen joined near the town of Falkirk by a sequence of 11 locks – enclosed sections ofcanal in which the water level could be raised or lowered – that stepped down across adistance of 1.5 km. This had been dismantled in 1933, thereby breaking the link. Whenthe project was launched in 1994, the British Waterways authority were keen to createa dramatic twenty-first-century landmark which would not only be a fittingcommemoration of the Millennium, but also a lasting symbol of the economicregeneration of the region.

Numerous ideas were submitted for the project, including concepts ranging fromrolling eggs to tilting tanks, from giant seesaws to overhead monorails. The eventualwinner was a plan for the huge rotating steel boat lift which was to become TheFalkirk Wheel. The unique shape of the structure is claimed to have been inspired byvarious sources, both manmade and natural, most notably a Celtic double headed axe,but also the vast turning propeller of a ship, the ribcage of a whale or the spine of afish.

The various parts of The Falkirk Wheel were all constructed and assembled, like onegiant toy building set, at Butterley Engineering’s Steelworks in Derbyshire, some 400km from Falkirk. A team there carefully assembled the 1,200 tonnes of steel,painstakingly fitting the pieces together to an accuracy of just 10 mm to ensure aperfect final fit. In the summer of 2001, the structure was then dismantled andtransported on 35 lorries to Falkirk, before all being bolted back together again on theground, and finally lifted into position in five large sections by crane. The Wheel would

need to withstand immense and constantly changing stresses as it rotated, so to makethe structure more robust, the steel sections were bolted rather than welded together.Over 45,000 bolt holes were matched with their bolts, and each bolt washand-tightened.

The Wheel consists of two sets of opposing axe-shaped arms, attached about 25metres apart to a fixed central spine. Two diametrically opposed water-filled‘gondolas’, each with a capacity of 360,000 litres, are fitted between the ends of thearms. These gondolas always weigh the same, whether or not they are carrying boats.This is because, according to Archimedes’ principle of displacement, floating objectsdisplace their own weight in water. So when a boat enters a gondola, the amount ofwater leaving the gondola weighs exactly the same as the boat. This keeps the Wheelbalanced and so, despite its enormous mass, it rotates through 180° in five and a halfminutes while using very little power. It takes just 1.5 kilowatt-hours (5.4 MJ) of energyto rotate the Wheel -roughly the same as boiling eight small domestic kettles of water.

Boats needing to be lifted up enter the canal basin at the level of the Forth & ClydeCanal and then enter the lower gondola of the Wheel. Two hydraulic steel gates areraised, so as to seal the gondola off from the water in the canal basin. The waterbetween the gates is then pumped out. A hydraulic clamp, which prevents the arms ofthe Wheel moving while the gondola is docked, is removed, allowing the Wheel toturn. In the central machine room an array of ten hydraulic motors then begins to rotatethe central axle. The axle connects to the outer arms of the Wheel, which begin torotate at a speed of 1/8 of a revolution per minute. As the wheel rotates, the gondolasare kept in the upright position by a simple gearing system. Two eight-metre-widecogs orbit a fixed inner cog of the same width, connected by two smaller cogstravelling in the opposite direction to the outer cogs – so ensuring that the gondolasalways remain level. When the gondola reaches the top, the boat passes straight ontothe aqueduct situated 24 metres above the canal basin.

The remaining 11 metres of lift needed to reach the Union Canal is achieved by meansof a pair of locks. The Wheel could not be constructed to elevate boats over the full35-metre difference between the two canals, owing to the presence of the historicallyimportant Antonine Wall, which was built by the Romans in the second century AD.Boats travel under this wall via a tunnel, then through the locks, and finally on to theUnion Canal.

Questions 14-19

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage

2?

In boxes 14-19 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

14 The Falkirk Wheel has linked the Forth & Clyde Canal with the Union Canal for the

first time in their history.

15 There was some opposition to the design of the Falkirk Wheel at first.

16 The Falkirk Wheel was initially put together at the location where its components

were manufactured.

17 The Falkirk Wheel is the only boat lift in the world which has steel sections bolted

together by hand.

18 The weight of the gondolas varies according to the size of boat being carried.

19 The construction of the Falkirk Wheel site took into account the presence of a

nearby ancient monument.

Questions 20-26

Label the diagram below.

Choose ONE WORD from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 20-26 on your answer sheet.

How a boat is lifted on the Falkirk Wheel

Reading 3

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 28-40, which are basedon Reading Passage 3 below.

The Olympic Torch

Since 776 B.C., when the Greek people held their first-ever Olympic Games, the Gameswere hosted every four years at the Olympia city. Back then, a long journey for theOlympic torch was made before the opening ceremony of each Olympic Games. TheGreek people would light a cauldron of flames on the altar, a ritual devoted to Hera,the Greek Goddess of birth and marriage.

The reintroduction of flame to the Olympics occurred at the Amsterdam 1928 Games,for which a cauldron was lit yet without a torch relay. The 1936 Berlin Summer Gamesheld the first Olympic torch relay, which was not resumed in the Winter Olympics untilin 1952. However, in that year the torch was lit not in Olympia, Greece, but in Norway,which was considered as the birthplace of skiing. Until the Innsbruck 1964 WinterOlympics in Austria, the Olympic flame was reignited at Olympia.

The torch is originally an abstract concept of a designer or groups of designers. Acouple of design groups hand in their drafts to the Olympic Committee in the hope thatthey would get the chance to create the torch. The group that wins the competitionwill come up with a design for a torch that has both aesthetic and practical value. Afterthe torch is completed, it has to succeed in going through all sorts of severe weatherconditions. The appearance of the modem Olympic torch is attributed to a Disney artistJohn Hench, who designed the torch for the 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley,California. His design laid a solid foundation for all the torches in the future.

The long trip to the Olympic area is not completed by one single torch, but bythousands of them, so the torch has to be replicated many times. Approximately10,000 to 15,000 torches are built to fit thousands of runners who take the torchesthrough every section of the Olympic relay. Every single runner can choose to buy hisor her torch as a treasurable souvenir when he or she finishes his or her part of therelay.

The first torch in the modern Olympics (the 1936 Berlin Games) was made from aslender steel rod with a circular platform at the top and a circular hole in the middle tojet flames.

The name of the runner was also inscribed on the platform as a token of thanks. In theearlier days, torches used everything from gunpowder to olive oil as fuels. Sometorches adopted a combination of hexamine and naphthalene with a flammable fluid.However, these materials weren’t exactly the ideal fuel sources, and they could bequite hazardous sometimes. In the 1956 Olympics, the torch in the final relay wasignited by magnesium and aluminium, but some flaming pieces fell off and seared therunner’s arms.

To promote the security rate, liquid fuels made its first appearance at the 1972 MunichGames. Since then, torches have been using fuels which are pressurised into the formof a liquid. When the fuels are burnt, they turn into gas to produce a flame. Liquid fuelbecomes safer for the runner and can be stored in a light container. The torch at the1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics is equipped with an aluminium base thataccommodates a tiny fuel tank. As the fuel ascends through the modified handle, it issqueezed through a brass valve that has thousands of little openings. As the fuelpasses through the tiny openings, it accumulates pressure. Once it makes its waythrough the openings, the pressure decreases and the liquid becomes gas so it canbum up.

The torch in 1996 was fuelled by propylene, a type of substance that could give out abright flame. However, since propylene was loaded with carbon, it would produceplenty of smoke which was detrimental to the environment. In 2000, the designers ofthe Sydney Olympic torch proposed a lighter and cheaper design, which was harmlessto the environment. For the fuel, they decided to go with a combination of 35 per centpropane (a gas that is used for cooking and heating) and 65 per cent butane (a gas thatis obtained from petroleum), thus creating a powerful flame without generating muchsmoke.

Both the 1996 and 2000 torches adopted a double flame burning system, enabling theflames to stay lit even in severe weather conditions. The exterior flame bums at aslower rate and at a lower temperature. It can be perceived easily with its big orangeflame, but it is unstable. On the other hand, the interior flame bums faster and hotter,generating a small blue flame with great stability, due to the internal site offeringprotection of it from the wind. Accordingly, the interior flame would serve as a pilotlight, which could relight the external flame if it should go out.

As for the torch of 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City, the top section was made of glassin which the flame burned, for the purpose of echoing the theme of ‘Light the FireWithin’ of that Olympics. This torch was of great significance for the following designsof the torches.

Questions 27-29

Complete the summary below.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 27-29 on your answer sheet.

The Olympic torch, as requested by the Olympic Committee, will be carefully designed

so that it is capable of withstanding all kinds of 27 ………………….. Generally, the design of

the modern Olympic torch enjoys the 28 ……………………….. value. The torch must be

copied, and thousands of torches are constructed to accommodate thousands of

runners who will carry them through each leg of the Olympic relay. Each runner has an

opportunity to purchase the torch as a(n) 29……………………… at the end of his or her leg

of the relay.

Questions 30-35

Look at the following statements (Questions 30-35) and the list of Olympic torches

below.

Match each statement with the correct Olympic torch, A-H.

Write the correct letter, A-H, in boxes 30-35 on your answer sheet.

List of Olympic Torches

A ancient Greek Olympic flames

B Berlin Games torch (1936)

C 1952 Winter Games flame

D 1956 Games torch

E Munich Games torch (1972)

F 1996 torch (Atlanta)

G 2000 torch (Sydney)

H 2002 torch (Salt Lake City)

30 first liquid fuel

31 not environmentally friendly

32 beginning to record the runners’ name

33 potentially risky as it burnt the runner’s arms

34 special for a theme of ‘Light’

35 not lit in Greek

Questions 36-40

Label the diagram below.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 36-40 on your answer sheet.

● Glossary

Glossary

menace (n) = a person or thing that is likely to cause harm or threat

precipitation = water falling from the atmosphere as rain, snow or hail

eradication = the complete destruction of something

underbrush = bushes or small trees growing beneath large trees in a forest or wood

dilapidated (adj) = in a state of ruin because of age or neglectance

traverse = travel through or across; move back and forth or sideway

sieges (n) = a group of heron birds

dismantle = turn a machine or structure to pieces

commemoration = the action of recalling or paying respect to a dead person or a pastevent

replicate = make an exact copy of something

ascend = go or climb up

bum = the bottom of a body; a lazy person; a homeless person or a beggar

Evaluation Items

● Let’s get feedback from Tutor

IELTS Band Descriptors

BANDSCORE

SKILLLEVEL DESCRIPTION

Band 9 Expert user You have a full operational command of thelanguage. Your use of English is appropriate,accurate and fluent, and you show completeunderstanding

Band 8 Very gooduser

You have a fully operational command of thelanguage with only occasional unsystematicinaccuracies and inappropriate usage. Youmay misunderstand some things in unfamiliarsituations. You handle complex detailedargumentation well.

Band 7 Good user You have an operational command of thelanguage, though with occasionalinaccuracies, inappropriate usage andmisunderstandings in some situations.Generally you handle complex language welland understand detailed reasoning.

Band 6 Competentuser

Generally you have an effective command ofthe language despite some inaccuracies,inappropriate usage and misunderstandings.You can use and understand fairly complexlanguage, particularly in familiar situations.

Band 5 Modestuser

You have a partial command of the language,and cope with overall meaning in mostsituations, although you are likely to makemany mistakes. You should be able to handlebasic communications in your own field.

Band 4 Limiteduser

Your basic competence is limited to familiarsituations. You frequently show problems inunderstanding and expression. You are notable to use complex language.

Band 3 Extremelylimited user

You convey and understand only generalmeaning in very familiar situations. There arefrequent breakdowns in communication.

Band 2 Intermittentuser

You have great difficulty understandingspoken and written English.

Band 1 Non-user You have no ability to use the languageexcept a few isolated words

Band 0 Did notattempt thetest

You did not answer the questions.

Answer Key

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

1. spread2. 10/ ten times3. below4. fuel5. seasons6. homes/ housing7. TRUE8. FALSE9. TRUE10. TRUE11. NOT GIVEN12. FALSE13. FALSE

14. FALSE15. NOT GIVEN16. TRUE17. NOT GIVEN18. FALSE19. TRUE20. gates21. clamp22. axle23. cogs24. aqueduct25. Wall26. locks

27. severe weather conditions28. aesthetic and practical29. (treasurable) souvenir30. E31. F32. B33. D34. H35. C36. (a/tiny) fuel tank37. openings38. handle39. propane and butane40. double flame