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Grammar revision. Verb. Past forms. 1. Fill in the gaps with the correct form of the verbs in brackets: past simple, past perfect simple, or past perfect continuous.
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GRAMMAR REVISION
Verb. Past Forms
1. Fill in the gaps with the correct form of the verbs in brackets: past simple, past perfect simple, or past perfect continuous.
1. We no ________ (sooner / start) talking about Marion than she ________ (appear) in front of us. 2. By the time Francis ________ (arrive) at the café, we ________ (finish) our coffee and were ready to leave. 3. How long ________ (you see) Carol before you broke up with her? 4. It wasn’t the first time she ________ (fall for) someone so insensitive. 5. We ________ (only talk) for a few minutes before we realized we’d become good friends. 6. As they ________ (paint) their new flat all day long, they were exhausted in the evening. 7. They didn’t recognize me at first because they ________ (never see) me wearing a suit before. 8. Neither of them ________ (have) a long relationship before they started going out with each other. 9. I asked them about the rumor, but nobody ________ (hear) anything. 10. The babysitter went home with a headache because the children ________ (make) a noise the whole evening.
Verb. Future Forms
2. Fill in the gaps with the correct form of the verbs in brackets: future simple, future continuous, ‘be going to’, or present simple.
1. What ________ (do) about that swelling on your hand? 2. I promise I ________ (not touch) the chocolate cake until you ________ (get back). 3. I’m afraid I (train) hard for the charity marathon for those two weeks, so I ________ (not have) any free time. 4. The children ________ (definitely / enjoy) a picnic in the forest. 5. There’s too much oil in the pan. You ________ (spill) it all over the cooker. 6. Haven’t we got any onions? Right, I ________ (go) to the greengrocer’s to get some. 7. There ________ (not be) any ice cream left by the time they ________ (get) here. 8. I ________ (have) lunch at that fancy restaurant this time tomorrow. 9. That doesn’t look very fresh. Surely, you ________ (not eat) it. 10. (you peel) the potatoes for me, please?
Reported Speech
3. Complete the sentences by putting the verb into the correct form.
1. She wanted to know which supermarket did I________ ( buy) my groceries from. 2. He said he ________ (have) to buy something for his computer. 3. They told us not ________ (be) late. 4. She says it ________ (be) the best store in town and that’s why she doesn’t shop anywhere else. 5. Anna told me she ________ (have) been working in the sales department for just over a year. 6. Brian said that he ________ (must) pay his next installment by Friday. 7. Paula asked me if she ________ (can) borrow my credit card. 8. The manager said she (be) back in an hour. 9. Marcus told us that he wished he ________ (have to) work at his uncle’s bakery any more. 10. The assistant asked me ________ (wait) until his boss arrived.
4. Choose the correct option.
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1. He denied to steal / stealing anything from the shop. 2. They suggested visiting / to visit the local market. 3. She insisted for / on buying brand names. 4. She accused me of / for damaging the shirt before I brought it back to the store. 5. They warned me against to let / letting the waiter take my credit card away from the table. 6. He blamed / suspected me for wasting money on things we didn’t really need. 7. She promised / admitted to give me some extra money to spend on my birthday. 8. Her parents discouraged her from / for opening her own hairdressing salon. 9. She threatened to tell / telling the store detective that he’d stolen two expensive pens unless he gave her one. 10. The shop owner reminded them not touching / not to touch any of the vases on display.
Conditionals
5. Fill in the gaps with the correct form of the verbs in brackets.
1. They won’t buy a new house unless it ________ (make) use of renewable energy. 2. You can help clean the beach on condition that you ________ (not start) fooling around. 3. If they hadn’t built the factory, the lake ________ (not be) polluted now. 4. Supposing they hadn’t shut down the nuclear reactor, what ________ (happen)? 5. I ________ (not live) in a cold climate unless I had to. 6. ________ (not swim) in the river, or you’ll get swept away by the current. 7. Suppose they decide to cut down the trees, what ________ (you do)? 8. The area wouldn’t be flooded if the dam ________ (not fail) during the heavy rain. 9. When the plates move, the result (be) an earthquake. 10. If an earthquake hits and you are indoors, ________ (not try) to run out of the building. 11. If I ________ (not see) the ice melting so quickly, I wouldn’t have believed it was happening. 12. If the water ________ (not feel) warm enough, don’t go for a swim. 13. If the volcano erupted without warning, the locals ________ (have) little time to escape. 14. They might have been able to stop the oil from spreading if they ________ (act) more quickly.
READING AND SPEAKING
1. SCIENTIFIC ADVANCEMENTS
6. Read the text and answer the questions below it.
Drones Become Mining’s Flight to Safety
Jundee, Australia. Hundreds of feet underground here, scientists are experimenting with a technology that could transform how mining companies dig out rocks in dangerous, pitch-black caves: fully autonomous drones. The drones would fly without any pilot assistance into areas too risky for human miners. Using a rotating laser similar to those on autonomous cars, they would create three-dimensional maps more detailed than what is available now, helping miners excavate more gold and other commodities that might otherwise be missed. “It’s very sci-fi, ” said Zachary McLeay, a production engineer for Australian gold producer Northern Star Resources Ltd., after seeing a drone fly into a dark cavern during a recent test.
The trial, at Northern Star’s Jundee gold mine in Western Australia, is part of a broader effort by the global mining industry to embrace automation, which is driving down costs and improving safety. It also might lead to fewer jobs. Companies from South Africa to Australia are already using technology such as driverless trucks, mechanized drilling and extra-long conveyor belts to improve productivity as they look to rebound from the recent downturn in commodity prices. Automation can “save lives, and also save time and save money, ” said Mehmet Kizil, associate professor and mining-engineering program leader at the University of Queensland in Australia. “The industry is made a big jump in adopting this technology because the biggest cost in mining is labor. ” Drones have become a popular cost-saving measure in sectors as diverse as retail and insurance, and mining companies regularly fly them to get aerial views of their facilities. But taking the machines underground represents a new frontier, and one fraught with risk.
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Pitch-dark cavities can conceal dangers, such as falling rocks, with the potential to destroy drones that cost tens of thousands of dollars apiece. Adding to the challenge, a drone flying underground can’t use satellite-navigation systems, such as GPS, like it could on the surface. Scientists and mining engineers say drones could be deployed to investigate large underground caverns after they are blasted open by explosives. The rock blasted out of these caverns is trucked to the surface, where it is crushed and gold is extracted.
Currently, surveyors must use a laser-mapping device attached to a boom, and stick it as far into the cavern as possible. But a laser attached to a fixed point can’t capture everything, and it is too dangerous for human surveyors to go inside for a closer look. With a better map from a drone, miners could get a clearer picture of how much rock they have blasted out, modify their blasting technique if they aren't getting enough, and better plan the next cavern to blast. Drones could also collect maps of older sections of mines, making it easier to restart mining in those areas if commodity prices rise. In general, mining companies assume they can get 95% of the ore from underground using current methods, said Brad Valiukas, technical-services manager at Northern Star. Jundee alone is expected to produce more than $300 million in gold this fiscal year, so even a small improvement in efficiency is “a massive amount of money, ” Mr. Valiukas said.
In September, a team of researchers from Data61, part of the Australian government-funded Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, demonstrated at Jundee that a drone could fly by itself in an underground cavern where the pilot couldn’t see it. But that means the pilot also couldn't intervene if something went wrong. “It’s a pretty big step for us and it shows that this is feasible, ” said Stefan Hrabar, the Brisbane, Australia-based scientist who led the team. More work still needs to be done. Right now, researchers first must fly the drone with assistance from a pilot to build a preliminary map. Using the initial data, they can then program the drone to fly autonomously to certain locations. But the ultimate goal is a fully autonomous drone that can simply be taken underground and turned on, and then fly away to map a tunnel or cavern. Such drones could be tested in the next few months.
One of the riskier test flights Mr. Hrabar and his colleagues attempted at Jundee was an autonomous flight in a roughly 180-foot-tall cavern, the largest that had been blasted at the mine. “This is the moment of truth, ” said Farid Kendoul, another scientist on the team, just before the flight. The drone, whizzing on its six rotors, disappeared into the cave. It returned a few minutes later, though a hardware glitch required the pilot to help land the machine. Mr. Kendoul clapped his hands in the poorly lighted tunnel.
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