国家地理:不再冻人的五大湖(2)

But what Leavitt was doing the February day was a rare occurrence last winter across the Great Lakes. The long-term average for ice coverage¹ on all five Great Lakes -- Superior, Michigan, Erie, Huron, and Ontario -- is 54 percent. Last winter, ice covered only 19.5% of the lake's surface is a near record low.

但这个二月天拉维特所做的事，在去年冬天的五大湖一带却不常见。长期以来，苏必利尔湖、密歇根湖、伊利湖、休伦湖、安大略湖这五大湖的平均覆冰量是54%。去年冬天却仅有19.5%的湖面有冰覆盖，几乎是创纪录地低。

Some lakes in the region didn't freeze at all. Others saw only faint traces of ice around their edges, or froze briefly². The weekend before Leavitt's outing, temperatures in the region shot up to 40 degrees Fahrenheit³, and ice anglers slogged through slush in T-shirts.

这一带有些湖泊根本没有结冻。另一些则只在湖岸边有些微的冰，或只是暂时结冰。拉维特去冰钓前的那个周末，该地区的气温冲上了40华氏度，冰钓客是穿着T恤在雪泥中行走的。

One overly warm season isn't necessarily a harbinger of inevitable⁴. But increasingly, scientists can pick out patterns in the scattershot records of change from across the Great Lakes, and those patterns are pointing toward a sobering conclusion: The 2019/2020 winter, with its faint traces of ice, is likely just a taste of the future.

一次温暖过头的冬季，不见得就预示了未来必定是如此。但是科学家也越来越能从五大湖各地散乱的变化纪录中看出模式，而这些模式全都指向一个令人警醒的结论：只有少许湖冰的2019至2020年冬季，可能只是让人提早体验未来。

1 coverage   

n.报导，保险范围，保险额，范围，覆盖

参考例句：

• There's little coverage of foreign news in the newspaper.报纸上几乎没有国外新闻报道。
• This is an insurance policy with extensive coverage.这是一项承保范围广泛的保险。

2 briefly   

adv.简单地，简短地

参考例句：

• I want to touch briefly on another aspect of the problem.我想简单地谈一下这个问题的另一方面。
• He was kidnapped and briefly detained by a terrorist group.他被一个恐怖组织绑架并短暂拘禁。

3 Fahrenheit   

n./adj.华氏温度；华氏温度计(的)

参考例句：

• He was asked for the boiling point of water in Fahrenheit.他被问到水的沸点是华氏多少度。
• The thermometer reads 80 degrees Fahrenheit.寒暑表指出华氏80度。

4 inevitable   

adj.不可避免的，必然发生的

参考例句：

• Mary was wearing her inevitable large hat.玛丽戴着她总是戴的那顶大帽子。
• The defeat had inevitable consequences for British policy.战败对英国政策不可避免地产生了影响。