Read the following passage and answer the questions 7-9
Naval architects never claim that a ship is unsinkable, but the sinking of the passenger and-car
ferry Estonia in the Baltic surely should have never have happened. It was well designed and
carefully maintained. It carried the proper number of lifeboats. It had been thoroughly
inspected the day of its fatal voyage. Yet hours later, the Estonia rolled over and sank in a
cold, stormy night. It went down so quickly that most of those on board, caught in their dark,
flooding cabins, had no chance to save themselves: Of those who managed to scramble
overboard, only 139 survived. The rest died of hypothermia before the rescuers could pluck
them from the cold sea. The final death toll amounted to 912 souls. However, there were an
unpleasant number of questions about why the Estonia sank and why so many survivors were
men in the prime of life, while most of the dead were women, children and the elderly

Read the following passage and answer the questions 7-9
Naval architects never claim that a ship is unsinkable, but the sinking of the passenger and-car
ferry Estonia in the Baltic surely should have never have happened. It was well designed and
carefully maintained. It carried the proper number of lifeboats. It had been thoroughly
inspected the day of its fatal voyage. Yet hours later, the Estonia rolled over and sank in a
cold, stormy night. It went down so quickly that most of those on board, caught in their dark,
flooding cabins, had no chance to save themselves: Of those who managed to scramble
overboard, only 139 survived. The rest died of hypothermia before the rescuers could pluck
them from the cold sea. The final death toll amounted to 912 souls. However, there were an
unpleasant number of questions about why the Estonia sank and why so many survivors were
men in the prime of life, while most of the dead were women, children and the elderly.

Read the following passage and answer the questions 10-12
Erosion of America's farmland by wind and water has been a problem since settlers first put
the prairies and grasslands under the plow in the nineteenth century. By the 1930s, more than
282 million acres of farmland were damaged by erosion. After 40 years of conservation efforts,
soil erosion has accelerated due to new demands placed on the land by heavy crop
production. In the years ahead, soil erosion and the pollution problems it causes are likely to
replace petroleum scarcity as the nation's most critical natural resource problem.