VOA标准英语2014--US Helps Search for Flight 370 With Planes, Equipment 美国帮助搜索航班370

 

US Helps Search for Flight 370 With Planes, Equipment 美国帮助搜索航班370

The U.S. Navy has sent in several devices to search the bottom of the ocean, near where Malaysia Flight 370 might have gone down.  The pinger locator and an underwater sonar vehicle are traveling aboard an Australian ship. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti spoke¹ with a navy commander about the U.S. equipment being used for the search.

The P-8 Poseidon is one of the U.S. Navy’s most advanced surveillance planes.  There are now two of them flying over the Indian Ocean.

As seen on the Navy’s YouTube Channel, Poseidons are built for intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare².  Their mission is to find small objects.

Commander William Marks is aboard the USS Blue Ridge³, running the U.S. search effort from off the coast of Japan. He says this new search area has better weather and is closer to land.

“Our P-8 Poseidon flies about a nine hour mission and in the beginning, 3-3? hours of that was transit⁴ time.  Now, since the area is a lot closer than that, only about two hours of that is transit time,” says Marks.

But the one thing searchers need to succeed is to locate wreckage⁵, something floating identified as belonging to MH370.  Search coordinators in Australia warn the effort could last awhile.

Angus Houston of the Agency Coordinating⁶ Center says that there are virtually no leads.

“We don’t know what altitude the aircraft was traveling at.  We don’t really know what speed it was going at,” said Houston.

Commander Marks says that once any plane debris⁷ is found, the mathematicians⁸ will get to work.

“Our oceanographers will work backwards⁹.  They will reverse-engineer the winds, the sea state and the currents and they will reverse plot that to get a starting point,” says Marks.

Only then can the pinger locator be lowered into the water and dragged behind a ship.  It’s mission will be to detect the audio given off by the flight data recorders. 

The U.S. Navy pinger locator is now aboard the Australian ship Ocean Shield, cruising toward the search area. 

Also aboard is a side scan sonar device.  The autonomous¹⁰ underwater vehicle dives into the ocean on a pre-programmed mission.  It will take images of what is on the ocean floor.

 

But until any wreckage is found, the planes will keep flying.  And the ship will wait until it’s called to an exact location.

1 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。

2 warfare   

n.战争(状态)；斗争；冲突

参考例句：

• He addressed the audience on the subject of atomic warfare.他向听众演讲有关原子战争的问题。
• Their struggle consists mainly in peasant guerrilla warfare.他们的斗争主要是农民游击战。

3 ridge   

n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭

参考例句：

• We clambered up the hillside to the ridge above.我们沿着山坡费力地爬上了山脊。
• The infantry were advancing to attack the ridge.步兵部队正在向前挺进攻打山脊。

4 transit   

n.经过，运输；vt.穿越，旋转；vi.越过

参考例句：

• His luggage was lost in transit.他的行李在运送中丢失。
• The canal can transit a total of 50 ships daily.这条运河每天能通过50条船。

5 wreckage   

n.（失事飞机等的）残骸，破坏，毁坏

参考例句：

• They hauled him clear of the wreckage.他们把他从形骸中拖出来。
• New states were born out of the wreckage of old colonial empires.新生国家从老殖民帝国的废墟中诞生。

6 coordinating   

v.使协调，使调和( coordinate的现在分词 )；协调；协同；成为同等

参考例句：

• He abolished the Operations Coordinating Board and the Planning Board. 他废除了行动协调委员会和计划委员会。 来自辞典例句
• He's coordinating the wedding, and then we're not going to invite him? 他是来协调婚礼的，难道我们不去请他？ 来自电影对白

7 debris   

n.瓦砾堆，废墟，碎片

参考例句：

• After the bombing there was a lot of debris everywhere.轰炸之后到处瓦砾成堆。
• Bacteria sticks to food debris in the teeth,causing decay.细菌附着在牙缝中的食物残渣上，导致蛀牙。

8 mathematicians   

数学家( mathematician的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Do you suppose our mathematicians are unequal to that? 你以为我们的数学家做不到这一点吗？ 来自英汉文学
• Mathematicians can solve problems with two variables. 数学家们可以用两个变数来解决问题。 来自哲学部分

9 backwards   

adv.往回地，向原处，倒，相反，前后倒置地

参考例句：

• He turned on the light and began to pace backwards and forwards.他打开电灯并开始走来走去。
• All the girls fell over backwards to get the party ready.姑娘们迫不及待地为聚会做准备。

10 autonomous   

adj.自治的；独立的

参考例句：

• They proudly declared themselves part of a new autonomous province.他们自豪地宣布成为新自治省的一部分。
• This is a matter that comes within the jurisdiction of the autonomous region.这件事是属于自治区权限以内的事务。