Question

Ever wonder how much a cloud weighs? What about a hurricane? A meteorologist(气象学者) has done some estimates and the results might surprise you.
Let's start with a very simple white puffy cloud — a cumulus cloud（积云）. How much does the water in a cumulus cloud weigh? Peggy LeMone, senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, did the numbers. "The water in the little cloud weighs about 550 tons," she calculates. "Or if you want to convert it to something that might be a little more meaningful … think of elephants."
The thought of a hundred elephants-worth of water suspended(悬浮的) in the sky begs another question — what keeps it up there?
"First of all, the water isn't in elephant-sized particles（微粒）, it's in tiny tiny tiny particles," explains LeMone. And those particles float on the warmer air that's rising below. But still, the concept of so much water floating in the sky was surprising even to a meteorologist like LeMone. "I had no idea how much a cloud would weigh, actually, when I started the calculations," she says.
So how many elephant units of water are inside a big storm cloud—10 times bigger all the way around than the "puffy" cumulus cloud? Again, LeMone did the numbers: About 200,000 elephants.
Now, ratchet up(略微调高) the calculations for a hurricane about the size of Missouri and the figures get really massive(巨大的). "What we're doing is weighing the water in one cubic meter theoretically pulled from a cloud and then multiplying by(乘上) the number of meters in a whole hurricane," she explains.
The result? Forty million elephants. That means the water in one hurricane weighs more than all the elephants on the planet. Perhaps even more than all the elephants that have ever lived on the planet

1. 1.
   The weight of      is NOT mentioned in the passage
   1. A.
      a cumulus cloud
   2. B.
      a tornado
   3. C.
      a hurricane
   4. D.
      a storm cloud
2. 2.
   How did Peggy LeMone feel about the result of her calculations?
   1. A.
      She found it not convincing
   2. B.
      She thought it needed further calculations
   3. C.
      She was quite surprised at it
   4. D.
      She considered the calculations inaccurate
3. 3.
   What can be inferred from the passage?
   1. A.
      A storm cloud weighs about 200,000 elephants
   2. B.
      The water in a hurricane weighs more than that in any other kind of cloud
   3. C.
      There are less than forty million elephants living on the earth
   4. D.
      The water in the cloud is in very tiny partials
4. 4.
   What is the best title for the passage?
   1. A.
      How Much a Cloud Weighs
   2. B.
      How Much a Hurricane Weighs
   3. C.
      Surprising Results
   4. D.
      Elephants in the Sky

Answer 1

BCCD
试题分析：本文是一篇说明文，说明了气象学专家对以多云和飓风、一朵积云重量进行测试，测量结果令人吃惊。
1.细节题，由第一段第一行Ever wonder how much a cloud weighs? What about a hurricane和第二段第一行a cumulus cloud可以知道a tornado没有被提到，故选B。
2.细节题，由第一段最后一句A meteorologist has done some estimates and the results might surprise you.可以知道Peggy LeMone对这个结果很惊讶，所以选C。
3.细节题，由最后一段最后一句Perhaps even more than all the elephants that have ever lived on the planet可以知道地球上的大象不到4千万，所以选C
4.主旨题：气象学专家对云重量进行测试，把云的数量和地上的大象进行比较，就是把天上的云看成大象的重量，选D
考点：考查科普类短文