【趣谈英语】保卫奥运会的那支军队-The Army That Saved The Olympics

Pre-Listening Vocabulary

 

threaten: to give signs of causing harm or a problem

mild: not cold; comfortable temperature

luge: a sledding event in which the rider(s) travels down a chute feet first

artificial¹: not real

 

The Army That Saved The Olympics

In 1964, at the Winter Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria, a lack of snow threatened the Games. It was the mildest Austrian February in decades, and thousands of Austrian troops were called into action to make sure that the Games could go on. The soldiers went into the mountains and carved thousands of ice blocks to transport to the luge and bobsled runs. They also carted over 25,000 tons of snow to the ski courses. Since the 1980s artificial snow machines have been used by nations hosting the Winter Olympics. According to recent studies, the average February temperature at the Winter Games has been slowly climbing. Approximately 500 snow guns were set up in advance of the 2014 Olympics in Sochi.

1 artificial   

adj.人工的，人造的，人为的；做作的，假装的

参考例句：

• The new dam will form a large artificial lake behind it.新筑的水坝将会在后面形成一个人工湖。
• We don't use any artificial flavourings in our products.我们的产品不使用任何人工调味剂。