According to the information in the article, the “series of violent storms” mentioned in paragraph 1
FLORIDA HURRICANES
1 Before Hurricane Sandy tore through New York and New Jersey, it stopped in Florida. Huge waves covered beaches, swept over Fort Lauderdale's concrete sea wall and spilled onto A1A, Florida's coastal highway. A month later another series of violent storms hit south Florida, severely eroding Fort Lauderdale's beaches and a section of A1A. Workers are building a new sea wall, mending the highway and adding a couple of pedestrian bridges. Beach erosion forced Fort Lauderdale to buy sand from an inland mine in central Florida; the mine's soft, white sand stands out against the darker, grittier native variety.
2 Hurricanes and storms are nothing new for Florida. But as the oceans warm, hurricanes are growing more intense. To make matters worse, this is happening against a backdrop of sharply rising sea levels, turning what has been a seasonal annoyance into an existential threat.
3 For around 2,000 years sea levels remained relatively constant. Between 1880 and 2011, however, they rose by an average of 0.07 inches (1.8mm) a year, and between 1993 and 2011 the average was between 0.11 and 0.13 inches a year. In 2007 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) forecast that seas could rise by as much as 23 inches by 2100, though since then many scientists have called that forecast conservative. Seas are also expected to warm up, which may make hurricanes and tropical storms more intense.
4 Even as seas have risen over the past century, Americans have rushed to build homes near the beach. Storms that lash the modern American coastline cause more economic damage than their predecessors because there is more to destroy. The Great Miami Hurricane of 1926, a Category 4 storm, caused $1 billion-worth of damage in current dollars. Were it to strike today the insured losses would be $125 billion, reckons Air Worldwide, a catastrophe-modelling firm. In 1992 Hurricane Andrew, a Category 5 storm, caused $23 billion in damage; today it would be twice that
5 Most Floridians live in coastal counties. Buildings cluster on low ground; more people than in any other state live on land less than four feet (1.2 metres) above the high-tide line. Florida's limestone bedrock makes it easy for salt water from surging seas to contaminate its freshwater aquifers. And it relies heavily on canals for flood control, which a sea-level rise of just six inches would devastate.
Adapted from The Economist, June 15th , 2013
1 Before Hurricane Sandy tore through New York and New Jersey, it stopped in Florida. Huge waves covered beaches, swept over Fort Lauderdale's concrete sea wall and spilled onto A1A, Florida's coastal highway. A month later another series of violent storms hit south Florida, severely eroding Fort Lauderdale's beaches and a section of A1A. Workers are building a new sea wall, mending the highway and adding a couple of pedestrian bridges. Beach erosion forced Fort Lauderdale to buy sand from an inland mine in central Florida; the mine's soft, white sand stands out against the darker, grittier native variety.
2 Hurricanes and storms are nothing new for Florida. But as the oceans warm, hurricanes are growing more intense. To make matters worse, this is happening against a backdrop of sharply rising sea levels, turning what has been a seasonal annoyance into an existential threat.
3 For around 2,000 years sea levels remained relatively constant. Between 1880 and 2011, however, they rose by an average of 0.07 inches (1.8mm) a year, and between 1993 and 2011 the average was between 0.11 and 0.13 inches a year. In 2007 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) forecast that seas could rise by as much as 23 inches by 2100, though since then many scientists have called that forecast conservative. Seas are also expected to warm up, which may make hurricanes and tropical storms more intense.
4 Even as seas have risen over the past century, Americans have rushed to build homes near the beach. Storms that lash the modern American coastline cause more economic damage than their predecessors because there is more to destroy. The Great Miami Hurricane of 1926, a Category 4 storm, caused $1 billion-worth of damage in current dollars. Were it to strike today the insured losses would be $125 billion, reckons Air Worldwide, a catastrophe-modelling firm. In 1992 Hurricane Andrew, a Category 5 storm, caused $23 billion in damage; today it would be twice that
5 Most Floridians live in coastal counties. Buildings cluster on low ground; more people than in any other state live on land less than four feet (1.2 metres) above the high-tide line. Florida's limestone bedrock makes it easy for salt water from surging seas to contaminate its freshwater aquifers. And it relies heavily on canals for flood control, which a sea-level rise of just six inches would devastate.
Adapted from The Economist, June 15th , 2013
Gabarito comentado
Resposta correta: D
Tema central: interpretação de texto — extrair informação explícita do texto e distinguir o que o autor afirma claramente daquilo que é inferência ou opinião. Em questões desse tipo, a pista é buscar correspondência direta entre as palavras do enunciado e do texto.
Resumo teórico rápido: em reading comprehension, prefira respostas que tenham apoio textual direto. Evite alternativas que contenham termos absolutos como undoubtedly ou superlativos não mencionados. Procure verbos fortes do texto (ex.: forced, caused, predicted) — eles orientam a escolha.
Justificativa da alternativa D (correta): o texto afirma que “Beach erosion forced Fort Lauderdale to buy sand from an inland mine…”. A palavra forced indica que a compra foi imposta pela situação — ou seja, tornou-a inevitável/necessária segundo o próprio artigo. Portanto, D reproduz com fidelidade a informação explícita do parágrafo 1.
Análise das alternativas incorretas:
A — “constituted the worst natural disaster ever…”: o texto não faz qualquer afirmação comparativa desse tipo. Não há dado que classifique estes eventos como os piores de todos; portanto é uma extrapolação sem suporte.
B — “were a disaster not only for Florida but also for New York and New Jersey”: o parágrafo refere-se a Sandy ter seguido para NY/NJ, mas a “series of violent storms” mencionada em seguida atingiu o sul da Flórida. O texto não diz que essa série também afetou NY/NJ; logo, B não está apoiada.
C — “were undoubtedly caused by global warming”: o texto diz que oceanos mais quentes tendem a tornar furacões mais intensos e que o nível do mar sobe, mas não afirma que aquela série específica foi inequivocamente causada pelo aquecimento — hipótese forte demais sem evidência direta.
E — “destroyed a large section of the city of Fort Lauderdale”: o texto menciona erosão de praias e de uma seção da estrada A1A, não a destruição de grande parte da cidade. A alternativa exagera o dano descrito.
Dicas e estratégia: 1) Busque palavras-chave do texto (aqui: forced → “tornou necessário/inevitável”); 2) Desconfie de palavras absolutas (undoubtedly, worst ever, destroyed large portion); 3) Diferencie o que é fato relatado do que é interpretação científica geral (o texto distingue observação local de explicações/expectativas científicas — veja referência ao IPCC).
Fontes recomendadas para aprofundamento: relatórios do IPCC sobre elevação do nível do mar e materiais de leitura crítica (ex.: guidelines de leitura do TOEFL/IELTS para inferência vs. informação explícita). Também é útil revisar materiais da NOAA sobre furacões para contextualizar conceitos.
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