VOA慢速英语2014 AS IT IS 2014-04-23 Agent Orange Removal Continues in Vietnam

 

AS IT IS 2014-04-23 Agent Orange Removal Continues in Vietnam

Hello, my friends, and welcome back to the program that helps you learn and improve your American English.  I’m Jim Tedder¹ in Washington.

Today we return to Southeast Asia to hear about efforts to remove a dangerous chemical that was used during the Vietnam War.

Then …to the moon!  In fact …into the moon.  NASA has sent a spacecraft crashing into our nightly neighbor to study …of all things …dust!  If you stay with us, you’ll find out why.

As It Is …from VOA …is on the air. 

 

Officials from the United States and Vietnam attended a ceremony last weekend at a former U.S. air base in central Vietnam.  The event marked a new step in efforts to clean up a chemical used by American forces during the Vietnam War.  The U.S. military used the chemical, known as Agent Orange, to destroy plants and trees.  Agent Orange has been linked to some forms of cancer and other health problems.  Jonathan Evans tells us more.

The U.S. military used Agent Orange during the Vietnam War to destroy tree cover for communist troops.  However, the herbicide releases a poisonous byproduct or dioxin.  It has been linked to diseases such as diabetes², cancer and birth defects.

Last Saturday, officials from both countries met at the Da Nang air base, where Agent Orange was once stored.  The base is one of 28 dioxin hotspots in Vietnam.  Officials plan to clean up the polluted soil in the affected³ areas by cooking it at high temperatures.

David Shear⁴ is the U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam.  He spoke⁵ about the clean-up process.

"We built a containment⁶ structure roughly the size of a football field and filled it with 45,000 cubic meters of dioxin-contaminated soil...Beginning today the contaminated soil will be heated to extremely high temperatures to destroy dioxin. After approximately four months the soil will be tested to confirm that the project cleanup goals have been achieved."

Patrick Leahy is a Senator from the American state of Vermont.  He says the Agent Orange project has four goals.

"First to eliminate the danger from dioxin to people living here.  Second to show that for so many years, the US didn’t ignore this problem, we returned to take care of it.  Third, our two countries can work together on a problem that for more than three decades was an obstacle for better relations.  Fourth to improve services for people with disabilities regardless of the cause, including what may have been caused by Agent Orange."

Repairing relations has been an important issue for the U.S. and Vietnam since the two sides re-established ties nearly 20 years ago.  The cleanup is a sign of progress in cooperation between the two governments.  Ambassador Shear spoke about this cooperation during his speech at the event.

"President Obama and President Sang inaugurated the new US-Vietnam comprehensive partnership⁸ last summer. I can think of no better example for our growing friendship than this project."

The United States continues to provide money for the Agent Orange cleanup and projects to help people with disabilities in Vietnam.  But the U.S. has never admitted responsibility for health problems caused by dioxin.

Carl Thayer is a professor from the University of New South Wales in Australia.

"America is trying to avoid all the one-to-one compensation cases by arguing the scientific basis is not clear, you have no basis, you don’t know what the genetics of the people were to begin with. That’s what a good defense⁹ lawyer would do."

In 2004, a group of Vietnamese took legal action against the chemical companies that produced Agent Orange.  But a U.S. federal judge dismissed the case.  The judge ruled that the use of Agent Orange did not violate international law at the time it was used.

Nguyen Chi Vinh is Vietnam's Vice⁷ Minister of National Defense.  He believes the Agent Orange project is an opportunity to look to the future.

He says he believes the success of the Agent Orange project does not depends on fixing past issues, but on opening a new road for the future. I’m Jonathan Evans.

The Moon is a Dusty Place

Recently, the American space agency, NASA, directed one of its spacecraft to crash on the moon.  The spacecraft was known as the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer, or LADEE. 

Before the crashing on the moon’s surface, NASA scientists collected information from LADEE.  Mario Ritter likes looking at the moon, and he tells us about some early findings.

NASA launched the spacecraft from its Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on September 6, 2013.  A Minotaur V rocket carried LADEE into space.

“Seven, Six, Five, Four, Three, Two, One, Zero.  Ignition and lift off of Minotaur V with LADEE, pursuing a mission of moon dust and the lunar atmosphere…”

LADEE has been orbiting the moon since last October.  The tube-shaped vehicle was about the size of a vending¹⁰ machine, with solar equipment on its sides.  The goal was to study dust in the moon’s atmosphere.  Butler Hine is project manager with NASA’s Ames Research Center in California.  Speaking by Skype, he says LADEE began taking measurements at 250 kilometers above the moon’s surface.

“And as we got lower into the science orbit, the dust density¹¹ just kept increasing.”

So where does all that dust come from?  And how does it move around on the moon?  To answer those questions, LADEE’s instruments made about 700,000 measurements.

“And one of the things that we saw is that it is almost a continuous shroud¹² around the moon, and some of the production of the dust is done by meteorite¹³ impacts to the moon, and that’s kind of a continuous rain on the moon.  And so the source of the dust is kind of a continuous thing.”

Butler Hine says a moon-based observatory¹⁴ would have to deal with all the dust.  But he thinks the dust would not cause problems for spacecraft or human activity on the surface.

“And what we’ve seen so far is that while there’s a lot of dust, the levels are high, we haven’t seen any indication that that level of dust is a hazard at all.  We haven’t seen any degradation¹⁵ of our spacecraft systems, for instance, and the dust levels that we do detect wouldn’t pose a significant risk to any future mission.”

LADEE found evidence of neon, argon, methane¹⁶, carbon dioxide and other substances.  It also successfully tested a broadband communication system between Earth and the moon.  Butler Hine thinks LADEE’s space bus design could be copied for other missions.

“The spacecraft can be put together in different ways, depending on the type of mission.  So for instance, this bus (design) can be configured as a lunar orbiter, which is what LADEE is…It’s designed for the environment anywhere between the Earth orbit and Mars orbit.  It’s even designed as a lunar lander configuration¹⁷.  So you can take some of the bus modules¹⁸, put them together in a fashion where it could land on the moon.”

NASA scientists were concerned about a lunar eclipse during LADEE’s final days.  During this period, the solar equipment was in total darkness.  For four hours, the spacecraft had to depend on battery power to protect its systems from freezing.

“We basically prepared the spacecraft ahead of the eclipse, where we turned off the science instruments to conserve¹⁹ power.  We turned on and off different heaters or configured them to go on and off and then we let it fly through the eclipse.”

But LADEE did not need much more power.  The spacecraft was programmed to crash on the far side of the moon, far from the historic areas where astronauts have landed.  It continued to gather and send information to Earth in its final days.  I’m Mario Ritter.

1 tedder   

n.（干草）翻晒者，翻晒机

参考例句：

• Jim Tedder has more. 吉姆？特德将给我们做更多的介绍。 来自互联网
• Jim Tedder tells us more. 吉姆？泰德给我们带来更详细的报道。 来自互联网

2 diabetes   

n.糖尿病

参考例句：

• In case of diabetes, physicians advise against the use of sugar.对于糖尿病患者，医生告诫他们不要吃糖。
• Diabetes is caused by a fault in the insulin production of the body.糖尿病是由体內胰岛素分泌失调引起的。

3 affected   

adj.不自然的，假装的

参考例句：

• She showed an affected interest in our subject.她假装对我们的课题感到兴趣。
• His manners are affected.他的态度不自然。

4 shear   

n.修剪，剪下的东西，羊的一岁；vt.剪掉，割，剥夺；vi.修剪，切割，剥夺，穿越

参考例句：

• Every spring they shear off the sheep's wool and sell it.每年春天他们都要剪下羊毛去卖。
• In the Hebrides they shear their sheep later than anywhere else.在赫伯里兹，剪羊毛的时间比其他任何地方都要晚。

5 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

6 containment   

n.阻止，遏制；容量

参考例句：

• Your list might include such things as cost containment,quality,or customer satisfaction.你的清单上应列有诸如成本控制、产品质量、客户满意程度等内容。
• Insularity and self-containment,it is argued,go hand in hand.他们争论说，心胸狭窄和自我封闭是并存的。

7 vice   

n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的

参考例句：

• He guarded himself against vice.他避免染上坏习惯。
• They are sunk in the depth of vice.他们堕入了罪恶的深渊。

8 partnership   

n.合作关系，伙伴关系

参考例句：

• The company has gone into partnership with Swiss Bank Corporation.这家公司已经和瑞士银行公司建立合作关系。
• Martin has taken him into general partnership in his company.马丁已让他成为公司的普通合伙人。

9 defense   

n.防御，保卫；[pl.]防务工事；辩护，答辩

参考例句：

• The accused has the right to defense.被告人有权获得辩护。
• The war has impacted the area with military and defense workers.战争使那个地区挤满了军队和防御工程人员。

10 vending   

v.出售（尤指土地等财产）( vend的现在分词 )；（尤指在公共场所）贩卖；发表（意见，言论）；声明

参考例句：

• Why Are You Banging on the Vending Machine? 你为什么敲打这台自动售货机？ 来自朗文快捷英语教程 2
• Coca-Cola had to adapt almost 300,000 vending machines to accept the new coins. 可口可乐公司必须使将近三十万台自动贩卖机接受新货币。 来自超越目标英语 第5册

11 density   

n.密集，密度，浓度

参考例句：

• The population density of that country is 685 per square mile.那个国家的人口密度为每平方英里685人。
• The region has a very high population density.该地区的人口密度很高。

12 shroud   

n.裹尸布，寿衣；罩，幕；vt.覆盖，隐藏

参考例句：

• His past was enveloped in a shroud of mystery.他的过去被裹上一层神秘色彩。
• How can I do under shroud of a dark sky?在黑暗的天空的笼罩下，我该怎么做呢？

13 meteorite   

n.陨石；流星

参考例句：

• The meteorite in Jilin Exhibition Hall is believed to be the largest in the world.吉林展览馆的陨石被认为是世界上最大的。
• The famous Murchison meteorite smashed into the Australian ground in 1969.1969年著名的默奇森陨石轰然坠落在澳大利亚。

14 observatory   

n.天文台，气象台，瞭望台，观测台

参考例句：

• Guy's house was close to the observatory.盖伊的房子离天文台很近。
• Officials from Greenwich Observatory have the clock checked twice a day.格林威治天文台的职员们每天对大钟检查两次。

15 degradation   

n.降级；低落；退化；陵削；降解；衰变

参考例句：

• There are serious problems of land degradation in some arid zones.在一些干旱地带存在严重的土地退化问题。
• Gambling is always coupled with degradation.赌博总是与堕落相联系。

16 methane   

n.甲烷，沼气

参考例句：

• The blast was caused by pockets of methane gas that ignited.爆炸是由数袋甲烷气体着火引起的。
• Methane may have extraterrestrial significance.甲烷具有星际意义。

17 configuration   

n.结构，布局，形态，(计算机)配置

参考例句：

• Geographers study the configuration of the mountains.地理学家研究山脉的地形轮廓。
• Prices range from $119 to $199,depending on the particular configuration.价格因具体配置而异，从119美元至199美元不等。

18 modules   

n.模块( module的名词复数 )；单元；（宇宙飞船上各个独立的）舱；组件

参考例句：

• The course consists of ten core modules and five optional modules. 这门课程包括十个必修单元和五个选修单元。
• Our English course is divided into modules on poetry, drama, and novels. 我们的英语课分为诗歌、戏剧和小说等单元。 来自《简明英汉词典》

19 conserve   

vt.保存，保护，节约，节省，守恒，不灭

参考例句：

• He writes on both sides of the sheet to conserve paper.他在纸张的两面都写字以节省用纸。
• Conserve your energy,you'll need it!保存你的精力，你会用得着的！