Can We Hold Back the Flood? Reading Answers

Dec 14, 2022

Can We Hold Back the Flood? Reading Answers contains a write up that explains about the flood and its setbacks. Can We Hold Back the Flood? Reading Answers comprises 14 different types of questions. Candidates in this IELTS Section will be shown various question types with clear instructions. Reading Answers comprises three types of questions: Matching heading, sentence completion, and Choose the correct option. For Matching heading in IELTS Reading passage, candidates need to thoroughly go through each passage. For sentence completion, candidates need to skim the passage for keywords and understand the concept. To choose the correct option, candidates must read the IELTS Reading passage and understand the statement provided. To gain proficiency, candidates can practice from IELTS reading practice test.

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Section 1

Read the Passage to Answer the Following Questions

Can We Hold Back the Flood? Reading Answers

LAST winter’s floods on the rivers of central Europe were among the worst since the Middle Ages, and as winter storms return, the specter of floods is returning too. Just weeks ago, the river Rhone in south-east France burst its banks, driving 15,000 people from their homes, and worse could be on the way. Traditionally, river engineers have gone for Plan A: get rid of the water fast, draining it off the land and down to the sea in tall-sided rivers re-engineered as high-performance drains. But however big they dig city drains, however wide and straight they make the rivers, and however high they build the banks, the floods keep coming back to taunt them, from the Mississippi to the Danube. And when the floods come, they seem to be worse than ever.
No wonder engineers are turning to Plan B: sap the water’s destructive strength by dispersing it into fields, forgotten lakes, flood plains and aquifers. Back in the days when rivers took a more tortuous path to the sea, flood waters lost impetus and volume while meandering across flood plains and idling through wetlands and inland deltas. But today the water tends to have an unimpeded journey to the sea. And this means that when it rams in the uplands, the water comes down all at once. Worse, whenever we close off more flood plains, the river’s flow farther downstream becomes more violent and uncontrollable. Dykes are only as good as their weakest link – and the water will unerringly find it.
Today, the river has lost 7 percent of its original length and runs up to a th ứ d faster. When it rains hard in the Alps, the peak flows from several tributaries coincide in the main river, where once they arrived separately. And with four-fifths of the lower Rhine’s flood plain barricaded off, the waters rise ever higher. The result is more frequent flooding that does ever-greater damage to the homes, offices and roads that sit on the flood plain. Much the same has happened in the US on the mighty Mississippi, which drains the world’s second largest river catchment into the Gulf of Mexico.
The European Union is trying to improve rain forecasts and more accurately model how intense rains swell rivers. That may help cities prepare, but it won’t stop the floods. To do that, say hydrologists, you need a new approach to engineering not just Agency – country £1 billion – puts it like this: “The focus is now on working with the forces of nature. Towering concrete walls are out, and new wetlands are in.” To help keep London upstream and reflooding 10 square km outside Oxford. Nearer to London, it has spent £100 million creating new wetlands and a relief channel across 16 kilometers.
The same is taking place on a much grander scale in Austria, in one of Europe’s largest river restorations to date. Engineers are regenerating flood plains along 60 kilometers of the river Drava as it exits the Alps. They are also widening the river bed and channeling it back into abandoned meanders, oxbow lakes and backwaters overhung with willows. The engineers calculate that the restored flood plain can now store up to 10 million cubic meters of flood waters and slow storm surges coming out of the Alps by more than an hour, protecting towns as far downstream as Slovenia and Croatia.
“Rivers have to be allowed to take more space. They have to be turned from flood-chutes into flood-foilers,” says Nienhuis. And the Dutch, for whom preventing floods is a matter of survival, have gone furthest. A nation built largely on drained marshes and seabed had the fright of its life in 1993 when the Rhine almost overwhelmed it. The same happened again in 1995, when a quarter of a million people were evacuated from the Netherlands. But a new breed of “soft engineers” wants our cities to become porous, and Berlin is theft governed by tough new rules to prevent its drains becoming overloaded after heavy rains. Harald Kraft, an architect working in the city, says: “We now see rainwater as giant Potsdamer Platz, a huge new commercial redevelopment by DaimlerChrysler in the heart of the city.
Los Angeles has spent billions of dollars digging huge drains and concreting river beds to carry away the water from occasional intense storms. “In LA we receive half the water we need in rainfall, and we throw it away. Then we spend hundreds of millions to import water,” says Andy Lipkis, an LA environmentalist who kick-started the idea of the porous city by showing it could work on one house. Lipkis, along with citizen groups like Friends of the Los Angeles River and Unpaved LA, want to beat the urban flood hazard and fill the taps by holding onto the city’s flood water. And it’s not just a pipe dream. The authorities this year launched a $100 million scheme to road-test the porous city in one flood-hit community in Sun Valley. The plan is to catch the rain that falls on thousands of driveways, parking lots and rooftops in the valley. Trees will soak up water from parking lots. Homes and public buildings will capture roof water to irrigate gardens and parks. And road drains will empty into old gravel pits and other leaky places that should recharge the city’s underground water reserves. Result: less flooding and more water for the city. Plan B says every city should be porous, every river should have room to flood naturally and every coastline should be left to build its own defenses. It sounds expensive and utopian, until you realize how much we spend trying to drain cities and protect our watery margins – and how bad we are at it.

Section 2

Solution and Explanation

Questions 1-6
The reading Passage has seven paragraphs A-G. Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter A-G, in boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet

A new approach carried out in the UK.

Answer: D
Supporting Sentence: To do that, say hydrologists, you need a new approach to engineering not just Agency
Keywords: New approach, carried out, UK
Keyword Location: 4th Paragraph, 3rd line
Explanation: It discusses the necessity for a fresh perspective on engineering as a whole. It goes on to say that working with nature's forces should now take priority; tall concrete fences should be replaced with fresh wetlands. Hydrologists advise that a new strategy be adopted in the UK to prevent London's upstream flooding from spreading to an area of 10 square kilometers outside of Oxford.

Reasons why twisty paths and dykes failed.

Answer: B
Supporting Sentence: Dykes are only as good as their weakest link – and the water will unerringly find it.
Keywords: Reasons, twisty path, dykes, failed
Keyword Location: Second paragraph, last line
Explanation: The passage discusses how today's water mostly travels unrestrained to the sea. This suggests that the water rushes down suddenly when it encounters an upland bump, and that the flow tends to become more ferocious and wild anytime the flood plains are closed off. This shows that the water current, which is likely to be uncontrollable when it travels farther downstream, is the reason why twisted routes and dykes fail.

Illustration of an alternative Plan in LA which seems much unrealistic

Answer: G
Supporting Sentence: Plan B says every city should be porous, every river should have room to flood naturally and every coastline should be left to build its own defenses.
Keywords: Illustration, alternative Plan, LA, unrealistic
Keyword Location: Last Paragraph, 2nd last line
Explanation:Plan B calls for every city to be permeable, every river to have room to naturally flood, and every coastline to erect its own defenses. This seems incredibly pricey and shows how the alternative plan in LA initially seems highly impractical and idealistic until it is realized how much money was spent trying to drain communities and safeguard the water margins.

Traditional way of tackling flood

Answer: A
Supporting Sentence: Traditionally, river engineers have gone for Plan A: get rid of the water fast, draining it off the land and down to the sea in tall-sided rivers re-engineered as high-performance drains.
Keywords: Traditionally, tackling flood
Keyword Location: 1st paragraph, 3rd line
Explanation: The author refers to the typical Plan A of river engineers to quickly remove the water by draining it off the ground and into tall-sided rivers that have been redesigned as top-level drains. However, the approach to dealing with floods was ineffective because the floodwaters continued to tease them and seemed worse than before.

Effort made in Netherlands and Germany

Answer: F
Supporting Sentence: A nation built largely on drained marshes and seabed had the fright of its life in 1993 when the Rhine almost overwhelmed it. The same happened again in 1995, when a quarter of a million people were evacuated from the Netherlands.
Keywords: Netherlands
Keyword Location: 6th Paragraph, 5th Line
Explanation: Nienhuis is quoted by the author as suggesting that rivers must be given greater room and transformed from flood-chutes into flood-foilers. The author also notes that Berlin is subject to strict new regulations to prevent its drains from becoming clogged after big rainfalls and that a new generation of soft-engineers wants the cities to be become porous.

One project on a river benefits three nations

Answer: E
Supporting Sentences: The engineers calculate that the restored flood plain can now store up to 10 million cubic meters of flood waters and slow storm surges coming out of the Alps by more than an hour, protecting towns as far downstream as Slovenia and Croatia.
Keywords: Slovenia, Croatia
Keyword Location: 5th paragraph, last line.
Explanation: The author discusses one of Europe's greatest river restoration projects that is now underway in Austria in the fifth paragraph. The engineers predicted that the reconstructed flood plan can delay storm surges coming out of the Alps by more than an hour and store up to 10 million cubic meters of floodwater, saving towns farther downstream like Slovenia and Croatia. One river restoration project helps three countries—Austria, Slovenia, and Croatia—and delays storms by up to 10 million cubic meters.

Questions 7-11
Ask the candidates to complete the summary of the given paragraphs using no more than two words.

Flood makes the river shorter than it used to be, which means faster speed and more damage to constructions on the flood plain. Not only the European river poses such a threat but the same things happen to the powerful_____________ in the US.

Answer: C (Mississippi)
Supporting Sentences: The result is more frequent flooding that does ever-greater damage to the homes, offices and roads that sit on the flood plain. Much the same has happened in the US on the mighty Mississippi, which drains the world’s second largest river catchment into the Gulf of Mexico.
Keywords: damage, U.S, river
Keyword Location: 3rd paragraph, last line.
Explanation: The author notes that homes, businesses, and highways located in flood plains sustain ever-increasing damage as a result of regular flooding. And that the great Mississippi in the United States, which empties the second-largest river basin in the world into the Gulf of Mexico, has experienced the same thing.

In Europe, one innovative approach carried out by the UK’s Environment Agency, for example, a wetland instead of concrete walls are generated not far from the city of ___________ to protect it from flooding.

Answer: D (London)
Supporting Sentence: Nearer to London it has spent £100 million creating new wetlands and a relief channel across 16 kilometers.
Keywords: Europe, innovative approach, UK, wetland, concrete walls, flooding
Keyword Location: 4th paragraph, last line
Explanation: The UK has invested more than 100 million pounds constructing additional wetlands and a relief canal across 16 kilometers, according to the author, in an effort to keep London upstream and prevent floods outside Oxford.

In 1995, the Rhine flooded again and thousands of people left the country of ___________.

Answer: F (The Netherlands)
Supporting Sentence: The same happened again in 1995, when a quarter of a million people were evacuated from the Netherlands.
Keywords: Rhine, thousands, people, left, country
Keyword Location: 6th paragraph, line 4 and 5
Explanation:Due to the floods from the Rhine in 1995, a quarter of a million people left the Netherlands.

A league of engineers suggested that cities should be porous, _____________ set a good example for others.

Answer: F (Berlin)
Supporting Sentence: But a new breed of “soft engineers” wants our cities to become porous, and Berlin is theft governed by tough new rules to prevent its drains becoming overloaded after heavy rains.
Keywords: engineers, porous
Keyword Location: 6th Paragraph, 6th line
Explanation: The author claims in the sixth paragraph that a new generation of engineers wants cities to be porous and that Berlin is subject to new regulations to keep its drains from backing up after heavy rains.

Another city devastated by a heavy storm casually is ____________ _, though its government pours billions of dollars each year in order to solve the problem.

Answer: G (Los Angeles)
Supporting Sentence: It sounds expensive and utopian, until you realize how much we spend trying to drain cities and protect our watery margins – and how bad we are at it.
Keywords: billions of dollars
Keyword Location: Last paragraph, 1st line.
Explanation: The last sentence claims that to remove water from sporadic powerful storms, Los Angeles spent billions of dollars building enormous sewers and concreting river beds.

Questions 12-13
Ask the candidates to choose two correct letters.

12 and 13: What two benefits will the new approach in the UK and Austria bring to the US according to this passage?

We can prepare before the flood comes
It may stop the flood involving the whole area
Decrease strong rainfalls around the Alps simply by engineering constructions
Reserve water to protect downstream towns to store tons of water in the downstream area

Answer 12: B (It may stop the flood from involving the whole area)
Explanation: The author states that the emphasis is now on cooperating with nature's forces in order to prevent London from flooding a 10-square-kilometer area outside of Oxford in paragraph D of the fourth section.

Question:

Answer 13: D (Store tons of water in the downstream area)
Explanation: The fifth paragraph F has a reference to this response. Along the river Drava's 60-kilometer course as it leaves the Alps, Austrian engineers are rebuilding flood basins. According to their calculations, the floodplain can currently hold up to 10 million cubic meters of floodwater.

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