NewsTracker Answers for week of May 19, 2008

Q: Up to 50,000 people are feared to have died in the devastating earthquake that hit China's Sichuan province last week. Where is China?

Circle the area on this map

Q: Days after the quake, the entire city of Beichuan was evacuated amid fears that it could be engulfed by a river bursting its banks. Over the centuries, flooding rivers have killed hundreds of thousands of Chinese. Which of these rivers is NOT in China?

A. Red

B. Yellow

C. Green

D. Pearl

C. China's Red River flows into Vietnam to the Gulf of Tonkin. The Yellow is called "the cradle of Chinese civilization." The Pearl is China's third largest and flows into the South China Sea between Hong Kong and Macau.

Q: The deadliest earthquake in recorded history hit China in 1556, when approximately 830,000 people were killed. Another one of the world's deadliest earthquakes struck in 2004. Where was it?

A. Chile

B. Indian Ocean

C. Kashmir

D. Japan

B. The Dec. 26 earthquake was centered off the west coast of Sumatra, Indonesia. It triggered a series of devastating tsunamis that killed more than 225,000 people in 11 countries.

Q: The United Nations lists China as the fourth largest country with a surface area of 5,963,275 square miles. That's just slightly smaller than United States' 5,983,240 square miles. The Russian Federation is the largest, but which is number two?

A. Australia

B. Brazil

C. Canada

D. European Union

C. While Canada's 6,195,450 square miles makes it second largest, its population of about 32.5 million is far less than the other areas. It has 5 people for each square mile, while the U.S. has 50 and China has 222 people per square mile.

Q: With a fast growing economy, China recently overtook the United States in ...

A. Auto production

B. Gross Domestic Product

C. Population growth rate

D. Carbon dioxide emissions

D. China produced 6.2 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2006 compared with 5.8 billion metric tons for the United States. However, the U.S. spews nearly 42,500 pounds of the greenhouse gas for each person, while it is about 10,500 pounds per person in China.