时间:2019-01-14 作者:英语课 分类:VOA标准英语2011年(六月)


英语课

Heavy Rains Bring Raging Floods - and a Debate


This spring, so-called "100-year floods" swamped many communities along the Mississippi River, America's largest commercial waterway.

The flooding was so severe that the U.S. Corps 1 of Engineers, which supervises national flood-control efforts, took the nearly unprecedented 2 step of opening giant floodgates to keep high water from reaching Baton 3 Rouge 4, the capital city of Louisiana, and the major port of New Orleans.

The result was the deliberate flooding of millions of hectares of rural areas and small settlements in Louisiana's already swampy 5 "bayou country."

Whether to hold back the river or let it flood is a longstanding issue on the Mississippi - one that crystallizes each spring in the city of Davenport, Iowa.

Over the past decade, floodwaters reached near-record levels there three times. Each time this happened, photos showed the city's baseball stadium nearly submerged, giving the impression that much of Davenport was under water.

Parts of it are submerged during floods, but it's by design. The city has chosen not to build floodwalls, instead, turning the lowest-lying parts in town into floodable parkland. It provides sandbags to the few residential 6 and business areas that take on some water during severe flooding.

It also moves a dozen or so homes out of the floodplain each year, and requires new homes built there to be elevated.

Critics say that floodwalls and levees could prevent the flooding altogether. But officials say dikes upstream from the city already act like a sluice 7, causing the river to flow even faster, deeper, and more dangerously through their town.

If they built levees, Davenporters say, smaller communities below would have to do the same - and so on, all the way down the river.

No thank you. So Davenport takes its floods in stride and lets the mighty 8 river do what rivers do from time to time.



n.(通信等兵种的)部队;(同类作的)一组
  • The medical corps were cited for bravery in combat.医疗队由于在战场上的英勇表现而受嘉奖。
  • When the war broke out,he volunteered for the Marine Corps.战争爆发时,他自愿参加了海军陆战队。
adj.无前例的,新奇的
  • The air crash caused an unprecedented number of deaths.这次空难的死亡人数是空前的。
  • A flood of this sort is really unprecedented.这样大的洪水真是十年九不遇。
n.乐队用指挥杖
  • With the baton the conductor was beating time.乐队指挥用指挥棒打拍子。
  • The conductor waved his baton,and the band started up.指挥挥动指挥棒,乐队开始演奏起来。
n.胭脂,口红唇膏;v.(在…上)擦口红
  • Women put rouge on their cheeks to make their faces pretty.女人往面颊上涂胭脂,使脸更漂亮。
  • She didn't need any powder or lip rouge to make her pretty.她天生漂亮,不需要任何脂粉唇膏打扮自己。
adj.沼泽的,湿地的
  • Malaria is still rampant in some swampy regions.疟疾在一些沼泽地区仍很猖獗。
  • An ox as grazing in a swampy meadow.一头牛在一块泥泞的草地上吃草。
adj.提供住宿的;居住的;住宅的
  • The mayor inspected the residential section of the city.市长视察了该市的住宅区。
  • The residential blocks were integrated with the rest of the college.住宿区与学院其他部分结合在了一起。
n.水闸
  • We opened the sluice and the water poured in.我们打开闸门,水就涌了进来。
  • They regulate the flow of water by the sluice gate.他们用水闸门控制水的流量。
adj.强有力的;巨大的
  • A mighty force was about to break loose.一股巨大的力量即将迸发而出。
  • The mighty iceberg came into view.巨大的冰山出现在眼前。
学英语单词
adnounce
after-condenser discharge line
almondine
Ardizzone
auto service
backed down
bacteriologic(al)examination
bow and beam bearings
bulgren
chamfer relief angle
chicago bule rw
clandestine trade
clinical psychologist
control limit
convoy fleet
Cook Strait
cophased horizontal antenna
cosmic biophysics
Ctenitis
Curiche
deglottalization
deviation of directivity
diethy-aceto oxalate
differentializing
discharge characteristics
diterpene alkaloid
elmets
enanthic acid heptyl ester
endocarpic
factory planning
Fedwire
filter-medium
four species
freight release
full
Gannano, L.di
genital gland
Glycosmis craibii
gnathostomes
growth form
Guidimaka, Rég.
Hanzan
hard salt
Hedyotis ovatifolia
helenine
heptranchias perlo
herban
hoof-and-horn meal
hybrid data acquisition system
hypocaloric
immune cell
in reaction to
incompletenesses
indirect dry cooling system with mixed condenser
inlet manifolds
intercycle cooler
isocaproate
isostatic warping
karelias
logolepts
lyndal
magnetic disk file
make a time about
molecular orbital hybridization
molecular specific heat
multigroup cross section
n-naphthylphthalamic acid
old catholic churches
olefines
oozed out
overspurn
petrol coupon
phenomenological analysis
pluck at sth
polygon warhead
pseudo-ochronosis
put something away
Razgon
reperched
schedes
self supporting structure
sequence valve (pneumatic)
show-jumping
Siljan
smoke agent
solangustine
Somateria
span 65
spot anthracnose
swanly
telegraph circuit
thermal stage
three old cat
throw a spanner in
tongue-bone
toxicityemission coefficient
trachorheite
Trevino
tzetze
verminal
working reference plane
Zalegoshcheskiy Rayon