PBS高端访谈:西海岸发生重大火灾

JUDY WOODRUFF: And now to the West Coast, where blowtorch winds where sent wildfires racing¹ anew today. Oregon's governor reported hundreds of homes had burned. And California struggled again to corral fires up and down the state. Stephanie Sy has our report.

STEPHANIE SY: Heavy winds and low humidity. The day's forecast brought fresh dangers to much of California, where smoke from two dozen active fires blotted² out the sun in the Bay Area, turning the skies an eerie³ orange.

WOMAN: All the windows are open in my house, and look how dark it is. This is crazy.

STEPHANIE SY: In Central California, the Creek⁴ Fire, among the biggest in the state, is still raging completely unchecked. Authorities say it has burned through more than 360 buildings and is threatening 5,000 more around the Sierra National Forest, east of Fresno. All national forests were closed down statewide today to prevent other fires from erupting. Farther north, another fire rapidly exploded overnight in Butte County, which led to evacuation orders and warnings, including for the town of Paradise, which was decimated by the state's deadliest wildfire in 2018. More than two million acres have been burned in fires across California, an unprecedented⁵ amount this early in the season. But the National Weather Service is warning of elevated fire risk in much of the Western U.S. Oregon is dealing⁶ with at least 35 active fires. Thousands have been ordered to evacuate⁷ and a state of emergency was declared overnight. Satellite imagery shows the staggering amount of smoke from fires there and in California. In Washington state, wildfires burned more acres in a single day than normally seen in a full year. Crews in Washington battled through the smoke-filled skies overnight. Much of the devastation⁸ centered around the small farming town of Malden in the Eastern part of the state.

SHANNON THORNTON, Wildfire Victim: Everything gone, clothes, beds, everything.

STEPHANIE SY: About 80 percent of homes and structures were destroyed. Strong winds are also driving fires in other parts of the drought-stricken West, from Arizona to Montana. Still, crews in some regions got a moment of respite⁹. A drastic temperature plunge¹⁰ around Denver, Colorado yesterday brought with it snow, helping¹¹ contain fires there.

EVAN SMITH, Manager, Rocky Mountain Connection: We had a little bit of unexpected weather roll in, weather in the 80s yesterday and now in the 20s today.

STEPHANIE SY: Extreme weather and extreme fires. But, back in California, there's reason to hope for a break.

GOV. GAVIN NEWSOM (D-CA): The wind activity appears to be dying down, which is encouraging. And the rest of the week looks a little bit more favorable.

STEPHANIE SY: For the PBS NewsHour, I'm Stephanie Sy.

朱迪·伍德拉夫：看看西海岸的新闻，那里的强风把今天的野火重新燃起。俄勒冈州州长报告说，数百栋房屋被烧毁。加州再次奋力扑灭全州的大火。请听斯蒂芬妮·西的报道。

斯蒂芬妮·西：大风和低湿度。当天的天气预报给加州大部分地区带来了新的危险，在那里，来自二十多个活跃火灾的烟雾遮住了海湾地区的太阳，使天空变成了可怕的橙色。

女人：我家所有的窗户都开着，看看有多黑。这太疯狂了。

斯蒂芬妮·西：在加州中部，克里克大火是加州最大的火灾之一，目前仍在肆虐。当局说，火烧毁了360多座建筑物，并威胁到弗雷斯诺以东的塞拉国家森林周围，那里还有5000座。为了防止其他火灾的爆发，今天全州所有的国家森林都关闭了。在更远的北部，另一场大火一夜之间在巴特县迅速扩张，导致疏散命令和警告，包括在2018年被该州最致命的野火摧毁的天堂镇。加利福尼亚州有超过200万英亩的土地被烧毁，这在这个季节的早期是前所未有的。但美国国家气象局警告说，美国西部大部分地区的火灾风险在上升。俄勒冈州至少有35起火灾。数千人已被命令撤离，并于夜间宣布进入紧急状态。卫星图像显示那里和加利福尼亚州火灾产生的烟雾数量惊人。在华盛顿州，野火一天内烧毁的土地比一年中通常看到的还要多。华盛顿的工作人员在烟雾弥漫的天空中彻夜奋战。大部分的破坏集中在该州东部的农业小镇马尔登。

珊侬·桑顿，野火受害者：所有的东西都不见了，衣服，床，一切。

斯蒂芬妮·西：大约80%的房屋和建筑物被毁。从亚利桑那州到蒙大拿州，强风也在西部干旱地区引发火灾。不过，一些地区的工作人员得到了喘息的机会。昨天科罗拉多州丹佛市的气温骤降带来了降雪，帮助控制了那里的火灾。

“洛基山连接”公司经理埃文·史密斯：我们遇到了一点意想不到的天气，昨天还是80华氏度，今天变到了20华氏度。

斯蒂芬妮：极端天气和极端火灾。但是，回到加利福尼亚，我们有理由希望休息一下。

加文纽森州长（加州）：风力活动似乎正在逐渐减弱，这是令人鼓舞的。而本周剩下的时间看起来更有利一些。

斯蒂芬妮·西：这是PBS新闻一小时的报道，我是斯蒂芬妮·西。

1 racing   

n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的

参考例句：

• I was watching the racing on television last night.昨晚我在电视上看赛马。
• The two racing drivers fenced for a chance to gain the lead.两个赛车手伺机竞相领先。

2 blotted   

涂污( blot的过去式和过去分词 )； （用吸墨纸）吸干

参考例句：

• She blotted water off the table with a towel. 她用毛巾擦干桌上的水。
• The blizzard blotted out the sky and the land. 暴风雪铺天盖地而来。

3 eerie   

adj.怪诞的；奇异的；可怕的；胆怯的

参考例句：

• It's eerie to walk through a dark wood at night.夜晚在漆黑的森林中行走很是恐怖。
• I walked down the eerie dark path.我走在那条漆黑恐怖的小路上。

4 creek   

n.小溪，小河，小湾

参考例句：

• He sprang through the creek.他跳过小河。
• People sunbathe in the nude on the rocks above the creek.人们在露出小溪的岩石上裸体晒日光浴。

5 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。

6 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

7 evacuate   

v.遣送；搬空；抽出；排泄；大(小)便

参考例句：

• We must evacuate those soldiers at once!我们必须立即撤出这些士兵！
• They were planning to evacuate the seventy American officials still in the country.他们正计划转移仍滞留在该国的70名美国官员。

8 devastation   

n.毁坏；荒废；极度震惊或悲伤

参考例句：

• The bomb caused widespread devastation. 炸弹造成大面积破坏。
• There was devastation on every side. 到处都是破坏的创伤。 来自《简明英汉词典》

9 respite   

n.休息，中止，暂缓

参考例句：

• She was interrogated without respite for twenty-four hours.她被不间断地审问了二十四小时。
• Devaluation would only give the economy a brief respite.贬值只能让经济得到暂时的缓解。

10 plunge   

v.跳入，(使)投入，(使)陷入；猛冲

参考例句：

• Test pool's water temperature before you plunge in.在你跳入之前你应该测试水温。
• That would plunge them in the broil of the two countries.那将会使他们陷入这两国的争斗之中。

11 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。