专八英语阅读：2024年专八真题 PASSAGE TWO
2025-02-19
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(1) It was well past midnight this past July and the round-the-clock Arctic sun was shining on Mercy Bay Exhausted Parks Canada archaeologist Ryan Harris was experiencing a rare moment of rest on the rocky beach , looking out over the bay's dark, ice-studded water.
Around him, a dozen red-and-yellow tents lined the shoreline the only signs of life.
Every day for the previous two weeks, work had started by mid-morning and continued nonstop for 16 hours.
Night and day had little relevance in the murky , near-freezing waters.Along with Parks Canada's chief of underwater archaeology,Marc-Andre Bernier,Harris has overseen more than 100 dives at this remote inlet of Banks Island in Aulavik National Park,exploring the wreck of HMS Investigator, a British vessel that has sat on the bottom of the bay for more than160 years.
(2) Harris and a small team of archaeologists had discovered Investigator in 2010 and returned in 2011 with a larger team to dive , study, and document the wreck, which holds a critical place in the history of Arctic exploration.Twenty-five feet below the surface,Investigator sits upright, intact,and remarkably well preserved.
Silt covers everything below the main deck , entombing the officers' cabins, the ship's galley, and a full library.The archaeologists had intended to leave the wreck and its artifacts where they had lain since the polar ship was abandoned , trapped in ice, on June 3,1853.
Artifact recovery was not part of their original plan , but that plan changed after their first few dives.
(3) The team was instantly surprised by the number of artifacts they saw-muskets (火枪)，shoes,and hunks of copper sheathing rested on Investigator's upper deck , dangled off the hull, or lay haphazardly on the sediment.
Leaving these artifacts behind in Mercy Bay would have made them vulnerable to the icebergs that regularly scour the bay's floor, including the ones the six-man dive team had been dodging since their arrival.
(4)Each piece fished from the water was a clue to life at sea aboard a ship during a period of British fervor for Arctic exploration.
The captain of Investigator, Robert McClure , was originally sent to find and rescue two ships,HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, that Sir John Franklin had led into the Arctic in 1845 to discover the long.
sought Northwest Passage connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.Investigator's voyage ended , without sight or word of Franklin's ships or crew, when it was set upon by ice in Mercy Bay.After 39 months at sea, the listing ship sat, slowly being crushed on all sides, for three frigid years--with no Inuit encounters,no British search parties, and no relief.
For much of that time, McClure and his crew of 60 were desperate and under constant threat of starvation, until a surprising rescue in the spring of 1853.Fifty-five men survived the ordeal.
(5) In July 2010, after months of study to pinpoint Investigator's resting place , the actual discovery of the wreck took just a few minutes.
Harris was in the bay in an inflatable boat testing sonar equipment when the wreck came into range.
The four hours of video gathered on that trip showed that the ship was, in essence, frozen in time, protected by the cold water and opaque, light-blocking ice cover.
It would be a year before they could return with cold-water diving equipment to have a closer, more detailed look.
Over that year, the Parks Canada team pored over photographs and examined glowing gold ultrasound images that showed timber from the wreck scattered across the upper deck like matchsticks.
They sought and received the blessing for a more intensive exploration of the wreck site from the 136 residents of Sachs Harbour, an Inuvialuit ( Inuit from the western Arctic ) community on the southwestern tip of Banks Island, the closest permanent community, some 125 miles away.
In addition to the underwater work to document the wreck,archaeologist Henry Cary led a land-based survey and excavation team of Inuvialuit archaeologists, conservation officers, and park staff.
It fell upon Cary to shuttle the 8,820 pounds of equipment up to the 74th parallel, including tents, a three-week supply of food, two boats, diving gear,compressors,recording equipment, surveying tools, and 20 barrels for collecting fresh drinking water.
(6) The archaeologists came prepared for delays,nasty weather, and polar bears--but they weren't prepared for the number of artifacts that needed recovery.Harris,Bernier,Cary, and their crews had packed cameras, lasers, and measuring tapes to document the sites but fewer items to help them retrieve,excavate, or transfer artifacts.Recovering the wreck's finds quickly used up their small toolkit for stabilizing artifacts:foam padding, tongue depressors,and gauze bandages.
(7)“We had not really envisioned the number of artifacts that were visible and exposed on the deck. So, basically, we had to improvise," says Bernier.
(8) Someone ripped the lid of a large black storage case off its hinges to use as a cradle to lift a bent and corroded musket from the frigid waters.A large food cooler was loaded with a shredded,twisted,oxidized sample of the copper sheathing used by the British navy to reinforce their Arctic fleet for contact with icebergs.
To protect a fragile rectangle of encrusted felt-a novel addition to Investigator that was intended to keep the ship watertight-Harris fashioned a cover out of absorbent chamois(鹿皮), ripped up an old black T-shirt to place underneath it , and sandwiched the artifact between floorboards taken from the boat that had shuttled them between land and the wreck.
The artifacts then made a more than 4,000-mile journey, by helicopter and commercial airliner , to the Parks Canada conservation lab in Ottawa, where they are being conserved and studied today,
15.Which of the following details about the underwater exploration is CORRECT?
A.The team began exploring the ship wreck soon after its discovery.
B.The original plan was to explore the ship and retrieve the artifacts.
C.The team spent their nights near a local residents' community.
D.Work started on the ship wreck during the team's second trip.
16.What can we learn about Investigator?
A. It was sent to discover a new sea passage.
B. It got stuck in ice and was later abandoned.
C.It got in touch with Erebus and Terror.
D.Its actual discovery was time-consuming.
17.Why did Bernier say that they had to improvise (Para.7)?
A. They had to fight against the treacherous weather.
B. They had little time to pack and stabilize those artifacts.
C. They did not have proper tools to excavate so many artifacts.
D. They had no idea what those artifacts were used for on board.
18.Which of the following words best describes the archaeologists' way of protecting the retrieved artifacts?
A. Incredible.
B. Innovative.
C.Imaginable.
D.Inefficient.
19. The last paragraph mentions all the following EXCEPT ___ .
A. who made the artifacts
B. where the artifacts were sent
C. what artifacts were recovered
D. how the artifacts were protected
27.What does the word “ones”in Para.3 refer to?
28. What was Sir John Franklin's mission?
29. List two preparations the team made for their trip(Para.5).
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