The great fire burned down     about 100 buildings.

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　　Japan escaped the world's most powerful earthquake in two and half years on Friday with only 400 injuries, most of them minor.

　　Damage from the pre-dawn quake－measuring 8 on the Richter scale－was relatively light, not only because it struck deep under the ocean but because Japan's population was prepared for such an event.

　　Power and water supplies were cut off for several hours after the event. There were no reports at 4:50 am (local time). Two fishermen are still missing, though. Police suspect they have been swept away by the tsunami (huge ocean wave) that followed the earthquake.

　　A wide area of the island suffered damage: roads were blocked, fishing boats sunk, and part of the ceiling of Kushiro airport, 900 kilometers northeast of Tokyo, caved in. Kushiro, a city of 190,000 people, was believed to be the hardest hit.

　　In the nearby city of Tomakomai, black smoke and flames rose into the sky from an oil tank fire. There were no injuries though, and the fire was contained within hours. Officials said 188,700 barrels of crude oil were lost.

　　Residents were shaken by the event, but stayed calm despite some 25 aftershocks－at least one registering 7.1 on the Richter scale.

　　The quake was the strongest worldwide since the 8.4-magnitude quake of June 23, 2001. That, near the coast of Peru(秘鲁), killed 74 people.

　　Takeshi Matsumura, a Hokkaido government official, said 455 people were confirmed injured by late Friday.

　　Only 28 were seriously hurt, mostly suffering from broken bones. Located along the Pacific “Ring of Fire”, Japan is one of the world's most earthquake-prone countries.

(Sunday, Sep. 30,2003)

1．According to the news, Japan was struck by the 8-magnitude earthquake on ________.

[　　]

2．Which of the following statements is true according to the passage?

[　　]

A．The 2003 earthquake that hit Japan recently was the strongest worldwide quake in this century.

B．A great part of the country was damaged because the Japanese were not prepared.

C．No people were killed in the earthquake but two fishermen disappeared.

D．Power and water supplies were cut off for only a few days.

3．What happened to the city of Tomakomai in the earthquake?

[　　]

A．It suffered a harder hit than the city of Kushiro.

B．Part of the ceiling of Tomakomai airport caved in.

C．A fire burned for only a few hours before it was controlled but some people were injured.

D．An oil tank caught fire and black smoke and flames shot into the sky.

4．The word “minor” in the first paragraph means ________.

[　　]

5．Which description about the quake of June 23, 2001 is true?

[　　]

A．It happened not far away from the coast of Peru, killing 74 people.

B．455 people were killed in the earthquake.

C．There were 25 aftershocks after the 8.4-magnitude quake.

D．It was the second strongest earthquake in this century.

A decade after terror struck America, we are starting to move forward.

It has been 10 years. In those awful days right after 9/11, I asked my colleague, Dave Barry, if he thought he would ever write jokes again. He was then the humor columnist for the Miami Herald. “For the last week,” he told me, “I haven’t even tried to write anything funny, and for a while I thought maybe I never would, or should.”

He had it; we all had it—that feeling of being stuck, unable to find your way back to the life you had lived before. I wrote 10 columns in a row about what I had seen, the planes crashing, the lives lost. Finally, I had to force myself to write a column about something that was not terror. That last one column. Then I went right back to what was normal.

That was a decade ago. Today’s terrors become tomorrow’s memories. News becomes history. And I find myself remembering how I used to kill ants when I was a child. The thing that struck me was that they always came back. Even if you destroy their world a hundred times, they build it a hundred and one times.

There is something of that in people. It may be one of the best things about us. We always fight the cruel things in life, bury our dead, rebuild, and find a way to move forward. We did it when fire burned down Chicago, after the earthquake in San Francisco, and after the floods in New Orleans. And we did it on September 11.

It is true that we have changed in ways that are not all good. We are at war on three fronts. We are running a strange prison on Cuba. The government may not tell you why.

Osama Bin Laden is dead. Experts tell us the terror group he led is weakened. However, terrorism remains alive in American political thought, which is becoming more extreme.

There is reason to be worried about these changes. But I am still grateful that we moved away from the 9/11 nightmare at all.

64. Which phrase can be used to describe Dave Barry’s feeling just after 9/11?

A. sad but confident                                          B. shocked and numb

C. frightened but hopeful                           D. heartbroken and angry

65. From Paragraph 3, we can conclude that ________.

A. no one ever feels safe anymore

B. there was no terrorism in America before 9/11

C. the author was so shaken that he stopped writing completely

D. many Americans were preoccupied with terrorism for some time.

66. With the example of ants, the author aims to show that ________.

A. he misses his happy childhood

B. he is sorry that he killed the ants

C. rebuilding is more important than sadness

D. people are tough and are able to recover

67. What’s the author’s attitude towards the American government’s policy against   terrorism?

   A. critical             B. supportive              C. uninterested           D. appreciative