Thirty-six killed and 45 injured in miles of flame

At least 36 people, including a family of five in a car, were burnt to death within hours yesterday as vast tracts of the southern part of Australia, parched by months of drought, burst into flames. Another 450 people were injured. Uncontrollable bush fires fanned by high winds engulfed nearly 300 houses in the states of Victoria and South Australia. And such was the fear, that 50 people evacuated from threatened or dying towns waded into the sea to evade walls of flames. Five small towns in Victoria were destroyed and ten others evacuated. Several towns in South Australia were also evacuated.

Flooding and landslides have killed up to 200 people and made about 2 million homeless in north-east and north Bangladesh, and monsoon rains are continuing to lash the region, officials said yesterday. In the eastern part of West Bengal state, at least 70 people have been killed by floods and landslides and 350,000 made homeless.

X. Read the text “Predicting Earthquakes”, pp. 32-33.

Can we predict the natural disasters?

Find in the text the methods we can use to predict the earthquakes.

XI. It is widely known that the disasters can be natural and man-made. You have found out that we can somehow predict the natural disasters, but the man-made disasters are unexpectable. Here is the text about one of the most terrible catastrophe in out country. Read and do the exercise after the text.

On April 26 1986, one of history’s worst nuclear accidents occurred at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power plant in the Ukraine. At 1:23 AM, technicians at the Chernobyl plant allowed the power in the fourth reactor to fall to low levels as part of a controlled experiment, which went terribly wrong. The reactor overheated and caused a meltdown of the core. This resulted in the explosive force of steam, which blew off the lid of the reactor. Large amount of radioactive material were released into the atmosphere. Wind carried the lighter radioactive material over the Ukraine, Belarus, Russia and parts of Europe.

Many people were affected by this catastrophe. The accident caused 31 immediate deaths that were mainly the result of exposure to radiation. The main casualties were among those who fought the fires caused by the explosion. Many children in the surrounding areas developed cancer due to the radiation emitted.

Today reactor-4 is buried in a cement tomb which was quickly built in order to allow the other reactors at the power station to continue working. However, this shelter is not strong and will not last and there are plans to replace it. Many people have suffered in some way as a result of the Chernobyl disaster and millions of dollars are still being spent today to contain reactor-4 and assure that no further radiation leakage occurs.

1. The Chernobyl disaster is thought to be…

a) as serious as the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings.

b) a minor accident with no future consequences.

c) one of many similar accidents.

d) Europe’s greatest catastrophe.

2. When the Chernobyl-4 reactor overheated….

a) technicians turned it down.

b) it melted the core.

c) the power plant was filled with steam.

d) it sealed the lid of the reactor shut.

3. The reactor-4 explosion resulted in the …

a) spread of the heavier radioactive material by the wind.