NewsTracker Answers for week of Aug. 17, 2015

Q: Chinese authorities have ordered the evacuation of residents within a 1.9-mile radius of a huge blast site in the port city of Tianjin because of fears of chemical contamination. Where is China?

Circle the area on this map


Q: A huge explosion last week in a warehouse killed more than 100 people, injured hundreds more and filled the air with tons of chemicals including deadly sodium cyanide. With about 15 million people, the Tianjin urban area is the eighth largest in China. What is the largest urban area?

A. Beijing

B. Chongqing

C. Guangzhou

D. Shanghai


D. With a population of 34 million people, the “functional urban area” of Shanghai is the largest in China, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The urban area of Guangzhou, once known as Canton, ranks second with 25 million people.


Q: Tianjin has a prominent role in the government's plans to cope with China's breakneck urbanization in a scheme to integrate it more closely with the neighboring urban area of the nation's capital . . .

A. Beijing

B. Chongqing

C. Guangzhou

D. Shanghai


A. Beijing, once known as Peking, has an urban area of 24.9 million – about the same as Guangzhou. Beijing became the capital of the Chinese Empire in 1420. Chongqing, formerly known as Chungking, served as the nation's wartime capital as the Chinese fought the Japanese from 1937 to 1945.


Q: With lax enforcement of weak environmental and safety laws and heavy use of coal, China has become the manufacturing center for the world's largest corporations. China's economy is now the world's . . .

A. Largest

B. Second largest

C. Third largest

D. Fourth largest


B. China ranks behind only the United States in Gross Domestic Product. It is followed by Japan and Germany. China's explosive economic growth has come with widespread air, water and ground pollution killing more than a million people a year. There also is growing income inequality and corruption of public officials by business interests.


Q: Chinese officials quickly silenced social media users who criticized the coverage of the Tianjin explosions. China is ruled by . . .

A. Military junta

B. Mandarins

C. Communist Party

D. Family dictatorship


C. The Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China is a group of 4 to 9 people who make all decisions of national significance. Power is concentrated in the Paramount Leader, currently Xi Jinping, who heads the three most important political and state offices.