 |
Ex. 11. Match the words referring to the railway cars given in column A with their definitions in column B.
|
|
|
|
| A | B |
1.  flatcar
| a) a railway carriage without a roof or sides, used for carrying goods |
| 2. intermodal container | b) a container with strength suitable to withstand shipment, storage, and handling |
| 3. shipping container | c) a railroad car that is enclosed and generally used to carry general freight |
| 4. boxcar | d) a type of railroad rolling stock designed to transport liquid and gaseous commodities |
| 5. tank car | e) a reusable transport and storage unit for moving products and raw materials between locations or countries |
Read the text and translate it using a dictionary if necessary.
Containerization
(1) Containerization is a system of intermodal freight transport using standard shipping containers (also known as “ISO containers” or “isotainers”) that can be loaded and sealed intact onto container ships, railroad cars, planes, and trucks.
(2) Although having its origins in the late 1780s or earlier, the global standardisation of containers and container handling equipment was one of the important innovations in 20th century logistics.
(3) By the 1830s, railroads on several continents were carrying containers that could be transferred to trucks or ships, but these containers were invariably small by today’s standards. Originally used for shipping coal on and off barges, boxes were used to containerize coal from the late 1780s. By the 1840s, iron boxes were in use as well as wooden ones. The early 1900s saw the adoption of closed container boxes designed for movement between road and rail.
(4) In the United Kingdom, several railway companies were using similar containers by the beginning of the 20th century and in the 1920s the Railway Clearing House standardised the RCH container. Five or ten-foot long, wooden and non-stackable, these early standard containers were a great success but the standard remained UK-specific.
(5) From 1926 to 1947, in the US, the some American railways carried motor carrier vehicles and shippers’ vehicles loaded on flatcars between Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Chicago, Illinois. Beginning in 1929, railway companies carried railroad boxcars on its sea vessels to transport goods between New York and Cuba. In the mid-1930s, the Chicago Great Western Railway and then the New Haven Railroad began "piggy-back" service limited to their own railroads. By 1953, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, the Chicago and Eastern Illinois and the Southern Pacific railroads had joined the innovation. Most cars were surplus flatcars equipped with new decks. By 1955, 25 railroads had begun some form of piggy-back trailer service.
(6) In 1955, businessman Malcolm McLean worked with engineer Keith Tantlinger to develop the modern intermodal container. The challenge was to design a shipping container and devise a method of loading and locking them onto ships. The result was a 8 feet (2.4 m) tall by 8 ft (2.4 m) wide box in 10 ft (3.0 m) long units constructed from 25 mm (0.98 in) thick corrugated steel. The design incorporated a twist-lock mechanism atop each of the four corners, allowing the container to be easily secured and lifted using cranes. Helping McLean make the successful design, Tantlinger convinced McLean to give the patented designs to the industry; this began international standardization of shipping containers.
|
|
|
(7) Containerization has revolutionized cargo shipping. Today, approximately 90% of non-bulk cargo worldwide moves by containers stacked on transport ships; 26% of all containers originate from China. In 2005[update], some 18 million total containers make over 200 million trips per year.
(8) The use of the same basic sizes of containers across the globe has lessened the problems caused by incompatible rail gauge sizes in different countries. The majority of the rail networks in the world operate on a 1,435 mm (4 ft 8 1⁄2 in) gauge track known as standard gauge but many countries (such as Russia, Finland, and Spain) use broader gauges while many other countries in Africa and South America use narrower gauges on their networks. The use of container trains in all these countries makes transshipment between different gauge trains easier.
Ex. 12. Go back to the text, guess the meanings of the following phrases and translate them into Russian:
sealed intact shipping containers, be transferred to trucks, modern intermodal container, to lessen the problem, to devise a method, containers stacked on transport ships.
Ex. 13. Search the text for the English equivalents of the following Russian phrases:
Запатентованная конструкция; несовместимый размер ширины колеи; поворотный запорный механизм; контейнер для смешанной перевозки; неизменно небольшой по размеру; перемещенный на грузовик; большинство железнодорожных сетей; составленные штабелями; транспортно-загрузочное оборудование; разработать метод; гофрированная сталь.
Ex. 14. Go back to the text and using the paragraph reference find the words which are similar to:
v transportation of goods; criterion; safe (paragraph 1)
v sources; worldwide; novelty (paragraph 2)
v transmitted; constantly; initially; intended (paragraph 3)
v boat; extra (paragraph 5)
v commodities; included; protected (paragraph 6)
v nearly; piled; entire (paragraph 7)
v disparate; work; the greater number (paragraph 8)
|
|
|
