美国国家公共电台 NPR Opinion: Is Anything More Urgent Than The Temperature Of Our Planet?

 

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

It's hot - historically, treacherously¹ hot - this week in surprising places - 109 degrees in Paris Thursday, the highest temperature ever recorded there. People plunged² into the Trocadero fountains to cool down while officials worried some of the charred³ walls of Notre Dame⁴ Cathedral that didn't fall in last April's fire might now dry out and collapse⁵ in the furnace of summer heat.

Scorching⁶ new records were also set in Belgium, the Netherlands, Britain and Germany, where the Wagner opera festival opened in Bayreuth in the un-air-conditioned swelter of a 19th century opera house. If there's anything more intimidating⁷ than a 3 1/2-hour German opera, it's sitting through it in a hundred-degree heat.

Northern Europe is not Dallas or Miami. The great cities on the continent have not been built to function in the kind of heat and humidity that struck there in recent years. More than 70,000 people died in the 2003 European heat wave. At least 650 more people died during the extreme summer heat in Britain last year. The hottest summers in Europe for the past 500 years have all occurred in just the past 17 years.

What do all those new heat records show if not that the climate is changing? The heat is especially dangerous for young children and older people and onerous⁸ for everyone. Bob Ward⁹ of Britain's Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment says scientists should name heat waves as they do hurricanes because they're public health emergencies.

Thousands of miles from Europe's summer heat, the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service has followed more than a hundred wildfires that have erupted in the Arctic since June. Scientists say the number of wildfires in Siberia, Greenland and Alaska is unprecedented¹⁰. And the cinders¹¹ from those fires drift down on ice and snow, which then absorb sunlight, causing even more warming in the Arctic.

Our Earth is in the middle of what may be the hottest summer on record. We've already lived through the hottest June. This may turn out to be the hottest July. A number of years from now, how many other important news stories we speak about this week will be as urgent as the temperature of our planet?

(SOUNDBITE OF CYESM'S "A PLACE IN YOUR MIND")

1 treacherously   

背信弃义地； 背叛地； 靠不住地； 危险地

参考例句：

• The mountain road treacherously. 山路蜿蜒曲折。
• But they like men have transgressed the covenant: there have they dealt treacherously against me. 他们却如亚当背约，在境内向我行事诡诈。

2 plunged   

v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降

参考例句：

• The train derailed and plunged into the river. 火车脱轨栽进了河里。
• She lost her balance and plunged 100 feet to her death. 她没有站稳，从100英尺的高处跌下摔死了。

3 charred   

v.把…烧成炭( char的过去式)；烧焦

参考例句：

• the charred remains of a burnt-out car 被烧焦的轿车残骸
• The intensity of the explosion is recorded on the charred tree trunks. 那些烧焦的树干表明爆炸的强烈。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 dame   

n.女士

参考例句：

• The dame tell of her experience as a wife and mother.这位年长妇女讲了她作妻子和母亲的经验。
• If you stick around,you'll have to marry that dame.如果再逗留多一会，你就要跟那个夫人结婚。

5 collapse   

vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做了一次彻底的调查分析。

6 scorching   

adj. 灼热的

参考例句：

• a scorching, pitiless sun 灼热的骄阳
• a scorching critique of the government's economic policy 对政府经济政策的严厉批评

7 intimidating   

vt.恐吓，威胁( intimidate的现在分词)

参考例句：

• They were accused of intimidating people into voting for them. 他们被控胁迫选民投他们的票。
• This kind of questioning can be very intimidating to children. 这种问话的方式可能让孩子们非常害怕。

8 onerous   

adj.繁重的

参考例句：

• My household duties were not particularly onerous.我的家务活并不繁重。
• This obligation sometimes proves onerous.这一义务有时被证明是艰巨的。

9 ward   

n.守卫，监护，病房，行政区，由监护人或法院保护的人（尤指儿童）；vt.守护，躲开

参考例句：

• The hospital has a medical ward and a surgical ward.这家医院有内科病房和外科病房。
• During the evening picnic,I'll carry a torch to ward off the bugs.傍晚野餐时，我要点根火把，抵挡蚊虫。

10 unprecedented   

adj.无前例的，新奇的

参考例句：

• The air crash caused an unprecedented number of deaths.这次空难的死亡人数是空前的。
• A flood of this sort is really unprecedented.这样大的洪水真是十年九不遇。

11 cinders   

n.煤渣( cinder的名词复数 )；炭渣；煤渣路；煤渣跑道

参考例句：

• This material is variously termed ash, clinker, cinders or slag. 这种材料有不同的名称，如灰、炉渣、煤渣或矿渣。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Rake out the cinders before you start a new fire. 在重新点火前先把煤渣耙出来。 来自《简明英汉词典》