第二部分：閱讀判斷（第16~22題，每題1分，共7分）

下面的短文后列出了7個句子，請根據短文的內容對每個句子做出判斷；如果該句提供的是正確信息，請選擇A；如果該句提供的是錯誤信息，請選擇B；如果該句的信息文中沒有提及，請選擇C。

Eastern Quakes Can Trigger Big Shakes

In the first week of November 2011, people in central Oklahoma experienced more than two dozen earthquakes. The largest, a magnitude 5.6 quake, shook thousands of fans in a college football stadium, caused cracks in a few buildings and rattled the nerves of many people who had never felt a quake before. Oklahoma is not an area of the country famous for its quakes. If you watch the news on TV, you see reports about all sorts of natural disasters —hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding and wildfires, to name a few. But the most dangerous type of natural disaster, and also the most unpredictable, is the earthquake.

Researchers at the U.S. Geological Survey estimate that several million earthquakes rattle the globe each year. That may sound scary, but people don’t feel many of the tremors because they happen in remote and unpopulated regions. Many quakes happen under the ocean, and others have a very small magnitude, or shaking intensity.

A magnitude 5.8 earthquake that struck central Virginia the afternoon of August 23, 2011, was felt from central Georgia to southeastern Canada. In many urban areas, including Washington, D.C., and New York City (Wall Street shown), people crowded the streets while engineers inspected buildings. Credit: Wikimedia/Alex Tabak

Scientists know about small, remote quakes only because of very sensitive electronic devices called seismometers. These devices detect and measure the size of ground vibrations produced by earthquakes. Altogether, USGS researchers use seismometers to identify and locate about 20,000 earthquakes each year.

Although earthquakes can happen anywhere in the world, really big quakes occur only in certain areas. The largest ones register a magnitude 8 or higher and happen, on average, only once each year. Such big ones typically occur along the edges of Earth’s tectonic plates.

Tectonic plates are huge pieces of Earth’s crust, sometimes many kilometers thick. These plates cover our planet’s surface like a jigsaw puzzle. Often, jagged edges of these plates temporarily lock together. When plates jostle and scrape past each other earthquakes occur. On average, tectonic plates move very slowly — about the same speed as your fingernails grow.

But sometimes earthquakes rumble through portions of the landscape far from a plate’s edges. Although less expected, these “mid-plate” tremors can do substantial damage. Some of the biggest known examples rattled the eastern half of the United States two centuries ago. Today, scientists are still puzzling over why the quakes occurred and when similar ones might occur.

16. Oklahoma is an area often experiencing natural disasters.

A. Right B. Wrong C. Not mentioned

【答案】：B

17. The earthquake is the most unpredictable natural disaster.

A. Right B. Wrong C. Not mentioned

【答案】：C

18. Few earthquakes happen without people's awareness.

A. Right B. Wrong C. Not mentioned

【答案】：B

19. Seismometers can identify and locate most of the earthquakes in China.

A. Right B. Wrong C. Not mentioned

【答案】：C

20. Big earthquakes of a magnitude 8 0r higher seldom happen far from the edges of tectonic plates.

A. Right B. Wrong C. Not mentioned

【答案】：A

21. Whenever tectonic plates move, earthquakes happen.

A. Right B. Wrong C. Not mentioned

【答案】：B

22. The earthquake that hit the eastern half of the United States two centuries ago is the biggest "mid-plate" one in history.

A. Right B. Wrong C. Not mentioned

【答案】：C

（責任編輯：vstara）

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