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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Los Angeles Against the Mountains.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Throughout the book, a predominant theme is that the following gets in the way of man's plans:
(a) Nature.
(b) Machinery.
(c) The economy.
(d) Environmental Protection Agency.

2. How much money does the Genofile family receive from the county in damages for an improperly designed and maintained basin above their house?
(a) Over three hundred thousand dollars.
(b) Over eight hundred thousand dollars.
(c) Fifty thousand dollars.
(d) Twelve thousand dollars.

3. The author recounts how the Genofile family wakes up one February night to the sound of what?
(a) Bears in the house.
(b) Sirens.
(c) Thunder.
(d) Crashing boulders.

4. Rabalais says he remembers being taught in high school that one day, these would be built:
(a) Ships to travel faster along rivers.
(b) Skyscrapers along the river banks.
(c) Lighter and sturdier barges.
(d) Structures to control water flows.

5. How much water is pumped onto a lava field directly in the path of the moving mountain headed towards Heimaey's town and harbor?
(a) Thirty million gallons.
(b) Three hundred thousand gallons.
(c) Three thousand gallons.
(d) Thirty trillion gallons.

Short Answer Questions

1. Both Iceland and Hawaii are the world's most what?

2. When Magnus Magnusson takes the author to visit an old monument in Iceland, what do they do?

3. In the 1800s, swamps in Louisiana are drained and used as what?

4. Carl Gunn, a retiree living in a small house at the base of a steep slope in Southern California, says he likes living there because of what?

5. What is Thorbjorn Sigurgeirsson's vocation?

(see the answer key)

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