A. BELIEVES B. UNDERSTANDS C. THINKS D. REALIZESREAD THE FOLLOWING...

Question

50. A. believes

B. understands

C. thinks

D. realizes

Read the following two passages and choose the correct answer to each question.

Every year in late December, a southward-moving current warms the water along the

Pacific coast of Peru. Because the warm current arrives around Christmas, the Peruvians

named it El Nino, “boychild”. Until the mid 1970s,

El Nino was an unrecognised local phenomenon, until scientists began to realise that El

Nino, later named El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO), is part of a huge ocean and

atmosphere system that is felt as far away as Australia and Indonesia.

Every few years the El Nino current is warmer than normal, causing greater ocean

warming and consequently changes in the normal patterns of sea and surface

temperatures. The resulting changes in atmospheric pressure affect trade wind speeds and

the location of the largest thunderstorms, thus affecting weather patterns around the

world. The shift in location of the Pacific’s largest thunderstorms, which usually occur

from the Western Pacific to the Central Pacific, changes global weather patterns because

the thunderstorms pump air into the atmosphere in different places than normal. The

result is a shift in the location of high – and low-pressure areas, wind patterns, and the

paths followed by storms.

From 1982 to 1983 the El Nino condition caused greater than average precipitation along

the US West Coast and sent five hurricanes to French Polynesia, which normally goes

years without hurricanes. That same year, El Nino was linked to floods in Louisiana,

Florida, Cuba, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia, and to droughts in Hawaii, Mexico, Southern

Africa, the Philippines, Indonesia and Australia.

In response to the 1982 – 83 global weather disruption, the World Meteorological

Organization initiated the Tropical Ocean and Global Atmosphere (TOGA) program. The

goal of the 10-year program is to gain a better understanding of El Nino so scientists can

forecast future El Nino episodes and their likely results.