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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. When the author recounts the moments before the 1973 eruption in Heimaey, he describes what?
(a) A violent shaking of the ground.
(b) A loud, deep sound emanating from the volcano.
(c) An uncanny silence settling over the land.
(d) Vibrations that are not unusual for the region.

2. Heimaey is considered to be an important what?
(a) Cultural hub.
(b) Polar bear sanctuary.
(c) Fishing center.
(d) Lumber producer.

3. How does Sigurdur Steinthorsson monitor volcanic gases during the 1973 eruption?
(a) Infrared glasses.
(b) Particle detector.
(c) Smoking cigars.
(d) Measuring static electricity.

4. What happens when the north side of the volcanic mountain in Vestmannaeyjar breaks loose?
(a) It falls into the ocean depths.
(b) It melts into the lava flow.
(c) It crushes most of the town's homes.
(d) It moves towards the town and harbor.

5. When does hot lava stop glowing red?
(a) When it hits an iceberg.
(b) Below fifteen hundred degrees.
(c) Below thirty-five hundred degrees.
(d) When the air temperature is minus twenty.

6. After work crews deal with the moving mountain on Iceland's erupting island, what challenge do they face?
(a) Orders from Iceland's government to stop all cooling efforts.
(b) Blinding blizzard that buries the equipment.
(c) New lava flow that threatens the town.
(d) Pumps that fail due to excessive heat.

7. What does Magnus Magnusson tell Thorbjorn Sigurgeirsson to protect first during the eruptions of 1973?
(a) Harbor.
(b) Fisheries.
(c) City.
(d) Canneries.

8. After the eruptions of 1973 end, how many of Heimaey's evacuees return?
(a) All of them.
(b) Half.
(c) Only a handful.
(d) Two-thirds.

9. What is Thorbjorn Sigurgeirsson's vocation?
(a) Environmentalist.
(b) Biologist.
(c) Chemist.
(d) Physicist.

10. What gives Thorbjorn Sigurgeirsson the idea to cool the oncoming flow of lava?
(a) Stories he'd heard of ancestors doing the same.
(b) Watching lava cool by the sea.
(c) Watching children play by the water.
(d) His post-graduate studies.

11. On January 23, 1973, the five thousand residents of Heimaey, the only populated island of Vestmannaeyjar, are threatened by what?
(a) Flu epidemic.
(b) Cracking ice shelf.
(c) War.
(d) Lava.

12. How long does the the Mauna Loa eruption of 1984 last?
(a) Three months.
(b) Three weeks.
(c) Thirty-three days.
(d) Thirty-three weeks.

13. Valdimar Jonsson is a professor of what?
(a) Thermal fluids.
(b) Icelandic folklore.
(c) Volcanic eruptions.
(d) Mob mentality.

14. In Heimaey, who is Sveinn Eiriksson?
(a) Reporter.
(b) Physician.
(c) Volcano expert.
(d) Fire chief.

15. Heimaey is about the same size as:
(a) Seattle west of the Space Needle.
(b) Washington, D.C. east of the Washington Monument.
(c) San Francisco north of Chinatown.
(d) Manhattan south of the Empire State Building.

Short Answer Questions

1. How much water is pumped onto a lava field directly in the path of the moving mountain headed towards Heimaey's town and harbor?

2. What ultimately happens to the moving piece of mountain on Vestmannaeyjar?

3. What position does Magnus Magnusson hold in 1973?

4. What does "City Flow" do in Heimaey?

5. During Thorbjorn Sigurgeirsson's test run to cool lava by the coastline, what happens?

(see the answer keys)

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