1 . Nearly two years ago, Lauren Kornacki, a recent college graduate, walked outside her family’s home in Virginia to ask her dad if she could borrow his car. As she rounded the corner from the front yard into the garage, Lauren, saw her father, Ale, lying unconscious, pinned on his back beneath his car. The car had fallen off the jack while he was changing the brake pads on the right rear tire.
Lauren yelled inside at her mother to call emergency services, and then ran to the car. “I thought, I’m going to lose my dad,” she says. Unsure of what to do, she stuck both hands under the wheel hub where Alec had removed the tire and pulled up with all her strength. To her surprise, she lifted the car. Then she held it up with one arm and, with the other, pulled her father out from under the car by his pants leg.
Alec wasn’t breathing, so Lauren, a lifeguard certified in CPR, began performing chest compressions. Within seconds, Alec took a breath and opened his eyes. “Stay with me,” Lauren whispered as they waited for the ambulance. “Just keep breathing.”
Doctors treated Alec for five fractured ribs, a fractured sternum, and fractured vertebrae, but he was able to return to his job as an IT professional two months later. Lauren, now a computer engineer, says she didn’t stop to think. “Everyone has a basic instinct to help the ones they love,” she say.
1. What had happened about her father when Lauren arrived at the garage?| A．He was replacing a part of his car. |
| B．He was lying at the right side of his car. |
| C．He was pressed under his car out of consciousness. |
| D．He was repairing the right rear tire of his car on the jack. |
| A．Her father could escape the death. | B．She hadn’t expected her effort so effective. |
| C．She was very anxious to save her father. | D．The car was not that heavy as she thought. |
| A．Professional emergency service. | B．Unconditional love from a daughter. |
| C．A strong and tough body. | D．A timely professional first aid. |
| A．The Girl Lifted a Car off Her Dad | B．The Gil Breathed Life into Her Dad |
| C．Dad Got Pinned Beneath a Car | D．A Loving Daughter and a Lucky Dad |
2 . I discovered the power of fear when I became stuck to my driveway, as if my feet were crazy-glued to the cement (水泥). As much as I tried, I could not move them. The realization that my daughters were playing in Nancy's house, just one-half block away, paralyzed (麻痹) my legs, making me unable to move when I neared the end of our driveway. Dense, black smoke was rising from behind the Sycamore Maple trees on the other side of the street and was enveloping three houses, making them barely visible. Nancy's house was one of them.
I tried to call out for my daughters, hoping to see them run safely to my arms, but my voice was also stuck-stuck in my throat with no intention of coming out. There I stood, helpless, paralyzed and silenced by fear, unable to protect the two lttle girls I loved more than even I had realized.
Although trapped in a body that couldn't move or speak, I could still hear. I could hear other mothers anxiously calling their children. I could hear a frightening silence that covered the neighborhood instead of the usual happy voices of children. And, finally, I could hear the alarm of the fire engine. As the alarm announced, "We're on our way," it instantly dissolved the crazy glue that had held my feet to the cement and it unlocked the soundproof box that had silenced my voice. I was free to make sure my daughters were safe.
As I continued down the driveway, two little girls, my two little girls, ran toward me from across the street. They had come home to tell me about the fire in the garage next to Nancy's house. Not only did my feet and voice work now, but my eyes were also in good working order and had no trouble producing tears.
1. Why was the author stuck to her driveway?| A．She was too tired to move her legs. |
| B．Thick black smoke blocked her view. |
| C．The cement on the driveway was still wet. |
| D．The fear for her daughters' safety struck her. |
| A．Shouting from other anxious mothers. | B．Strange silence in the neighborhood. |
| C．The alarm of the coming fire engine. | D．The courage to protect her daughters. |
| A．She burst into tears of relief and happiness. |
| B．She was really thankful to see her girls saved. |
| C．She was too excited to believe what she saw. |
| D．She overcame her fear and fully recovered. |
| A．Love in Fire | B．Stopped in Silence |
| C．A Narrow Escape | D．The Price of Fear |
3 . When she was just 17 years old, Jerry crashed into the back of a truck that was waiting to turn in a left turn lane. The crash is a life-changing one for her. Because of the crash, she’s blind in one eye, lost her sense of smell, lost some of her hearing, lost the ability to create tears, and she cannot fall asleep naturally.
“Initially, I thought I would not be defeated but clearly I was completely wrong. Apart from the medical problems, the hardest part about my life after the car accident was the fact that I was alone.” Jerry said, “Everyone was away at college, I wasn’t. I couldn’t drive, couldn’t go to college. My friends who used to hang around with me were there for me at first, but after a while they stopped coming by.”
“I looked up on her Facebook page, and she said on there: Can anybody please hang out with me today? I don’t have any friends.” recalled Jerry’ s mother, Ketty.
In time, Jerry and her mother teamed up with the US Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to make a video. They want to get the point across that texting while driving can have life-transforming consequences.
In the video Jerry appealed to drivers not to text while driving. She admitted she was checking and sending messages via her phone when she crashed her car into the back of the truck.
“Don’t text your loved ones when you know they’re driving,” said Jerry’s mother. “It can change their lives forever.”
“If you get a text, don’t look at it,” Jerry said. “It’s not worth it.”
1. What happened to Jerry when she was 17 years old?| A．She lost all her friends. |
| B．She couldn’t cry naturally. |
| C．She suffered a traffic accident. |
| D．She was waiting to turn left. |
| A．Having no chance to attend college. |
| B．Having no ability to live on. |
| C．Having unsolved medical problems. |
| D．Being alone without friends around her. |
| A．Because it caused her a life-changing result. |
| B．Because she couldn’t see the message clearly. |
| C．Because she was afraid to miss the message. |
| D．Because she couldn’t send the message quickly. |
| A．warn people not to use phones while driving |
| B．call on people to help accident victims |
| C．ask teens to be careful while riding |
| D．expose the truth of the car crash |
4 . It was 3:21 a.m. when nine-year-old Glenn Kreamer awoke to the smell of burning. Except for the cracking (爆烈声) of flames somewhere below there was not a sound in the two-storey house at Baldwin Long Island.
With his father away on night duty at a local factory, Glenn was worried about the safety of his mother, his sister Karen, 14 and his 12-year-old brother Todd. He ran downstairs through the smoke-filled house to push and pull at Karen and Todd until they sat up. Then he helped each one through the house to the safety of the garden. There, his sister and brother, taking short and quick breaths and coughing, fell down onto the lawn.
The nine-year-old boy raced back into the house and upstairs to his mother’s room. He found it impossible to wake her up. Mrs. Kreamer, a victim of the smoke, was unconscious, and there was nobody to help Glenn carry her to the garden. But the boy stayed calm and, as a fireman said later, "acted with all the self-control of a trained adult."
On the bedroom telephone, luckily still working, Glenn called his father and, leaving Mr. Kreamer to telephone the fire brigade and ambulance service, got on with the task of saving his mother.
First he filled a bucket with water from the bathroom and threw water over his mother and her bed. Then, with a wet cloth around his head he went back to the garden.
He could hear the fire engine coming up, but how would the firemen find his mother in the smoke-filled house where flames had almost swallowed up the ground floor?
Grasping firmly a ball of string (线) from the garage, Glenn raced back into the house and dashed upstairs to his mother’s room. Tying one end of the string to her hand, he ran back, laying out the string as he went, through the hall and back out into the garden.
Minutes later he was telling fire chief John Coughlan, "The string will lead you to mother." Mrs. Kreamer was carried to safety as the flames were breaking through her bedroom floor.
1. Why did Glenn run downstairs first?| A．He wanted to find out what was happening. |
| B．He was worried about his mother’s safety. |
| C．He wanted to save his sister and brother. |
| D．He went to see if his father had come back from work. |
| A．Glenn. | B．Glenn’s father. |
| C．Glenn’s sister. | D．Glenn’s neighbor. |
| A．unfortunate | B．confuse |
| C．terrified | D．senseless |
| A．his father had taught him to do so on the phone |
| B．he had learned something about first aid |
| C．he had dealt with the emergency calmly and wisely |
| D．he had followed his mother’s instructions |
5 . ROME— four people, including the wife of the factory's owner, died on Wednesday after explosions （爆炸）at the Barcelona Pozzo di Gotto fireworks company, Italian media reported.
According to online reports by La Republic and TGCOM24, at least one other person is missing and three others are seriously injured, with two of them in dangerous condition. Among the dead was 71-year-old Venera Mazzeo, the wife of the factory owner Vito Costa. Mazzeo reportedly died on the scene. Antonio Costa, the owner's son, was seriously injured and was transported to a hospital in the regional capital of Palermo for treatment. Less seriously injured persons were moved to the nearby Milazzo Hospital to be treated for burns and other injuries. Many were transported by local people who reached the scene before ambulances could arrive, reports said.
The factory, located near the northeast of the southern Italian island of Sicily, near the city of Messina, has been in operation for more than ten years without any accident. Police reports showed that two separate explosions took place, with the first explosion likely causing the second one. Media reports said that police have guessed that sparks （火花）from a repairing project reached some of the explosive material stored in the factory and was likely the cause of the first explosion.
Reports also showed that firefighters were able to control the flame, which burnt buildings on the factory and threatened nearby structures.
1. How many people lost their lives in the accident except Venera Mazzeo?| A．Three. | B．Four. |
| C．Five. | D．Six. |
| A．One worker's cigarette spark. |
| B．A fire nearby the factory. |
| C．The explosive material in the factory. |
| D．The sparks from a repairing project. |
| A．Antonio Costa died on the scene because of the flame. |
| B．Most injured persons were sent to hospital by ambulance. |
| C．The factory had been in safe operation before the explosions. |
| D．There were three explosions in total in the accident. |
| A．A travel guide. | B．A newspaper. |
| C．A magazine. | D．A science report. |
6 . The French submarine is called Le Triomphant, meaning “the winner”. The name of the British submarine is Vanguard, meaning “the leading position in an army”. It’s clear from the submarines’ names that they were made for victory.
However, it was an accident, rather than a victory, that led these two submarines to recently make news headlines across the world.
On February 16, Britain and France admitted that two of their nuclear — armed submarines, HMS Vanguard and Le Triomphant, collided while deep in the Atlantic in early February. Both submarines were on secret patrols (巡逻) and carrying nuclear arms when they collided.
Le Triomphant had no idea that it had run into HMS Vanguard until several days later. The French navy at first believed that Le Triomphant had hit an “object, probably a container (集装箱)”.
Investigations have begun to work out how such a collision could have happened. Both submarines are equipped with state-of-the-art (最先进的) technology that is supposed to find other submarines. Yet, neither submarine saw the other until it was too late.
One idea being considered was that their anti-sonar (抗声呐) equipment, which hides submarines, was just too effective in hiding one from the other.
Submarines use sonar to sense what is in the sea near them. Sonar is a submarine’s ear. Many sea animals use sonar as well. Dolphins produce high-pitched (声调高的) clicks. When these clicks hit an object, some of the sound will echo (发出回声) back to the “sender”. By listening to the echo and working out the time it took before the echo came back, the dolphin can work out how far away the object is.
There are two kinds of sonar: active sonar, which sends out signals, and passive sonar, which listens for signals with extremely sensitive microphones.
The two submarines were designed to be very quiet and as hidden as possible because a submarine’s job description (工作职责) is not to be found. Many modern submarines do not use active sonar, only passive sonar. This makes it very difficult for a submarine to “hear” if another submarine is near.
Britain’s Ministry of Defense (国防部) has said the collision did not lead to any radioactive leaks (放射物泄漏). The chance of a full nuclear explosion was almost impossible. However, experts say that if the walls of the submarines had broken, or a fire had been started, there could have been a major disaster.
A senior British Navy source told The Sun newspaper that the possible consequences of such a collision were “unthinkable”.
“It’s very unlikely there would have been a nuclear explosion. But a radioactive leak was a possibility. That would have been a national disaster.” he said.
1. What has made HMS Vanguard and Le Triomphant well known recently?| A．Their names carried very positive meanings. |
| B．They collided in the Atlantic this February. |
| C．They are both equipped with advanced technology. |
| D．They are both nuclear-armed submarines. |
| A．The two submarines were moving at a high speed. |
| B．Their anti-sonar equipment was too effective. |
| C．They were not equipped with active sonar. |
| D．The submarines were designed to be too quiet. |
a. The sound hitting the object.
b. Producing high-pitched sound.
c. The sound echoing back.
d. Working out the time to come back.
e. Receiving the sound.
| A．b—a—c—d—e | B．d—a—e—c—b |
| C．b—c—d—a—e | D．b—a—c—e—d |
| A．Both of the submarines carried nuclear arms when they collided. |
| B．Many modern submarines do not use passive sonar so as to be as hidden as possible. |
| C．The collision may have caused a disaster if a fire had been started. |
| D．There would have been a nuclear explosion if the two submarines had collided harder. |
