The locust plague（蝗灾）is affecting large parts of South Asia and the African continents. Huge numbers of locusts have been destroying farmland and threatening millions of lives.【小题1】

How can an insect be so terrible?

In history, locust plagues have been one of the three worst agricultural natural disasters.【小题2】The insect prefers to lay eggs in dry and loose soil. Nearly 5,000 groups of eggs can be found within a square meter, with more than 100 eggs per group. In addition, global warming means warmer winters, therefore more eggs can survive in the spring, raising the possibility of the outbreak next year.

How many times have humans suffered from locust plagues?

【小题3】In 2004, northern and western Africa experienced the largest locusts plague in more than 15 years. It cost 400 million dollars to fight against it and the harvest losses were worth almost 2.5 billion dollars. Late March 2013, nearly 50 percent of Madagascar was affected by locusts.

【小题4】

At present, the basic method of controlling locusts is with insecticides（杀虫剂）sprayed from the ground or the air. There are also biological pest control measures.【小题5】The biggest enemies are birds. Frogs, spiders, and mantises are natural enemies too. The method has proved effective and at a low cost.

Mr. Fuadi, from Indonesia’s Aceh province, fled the Boxing Day tsunami that destroyed several countries bordering the Indian Ocean in 2004. He then moved to Sendai, in Japan, where he escaped unharmed from another huge earthquake and tsunami in 2011. Some people compare him to Tsutomu Yamaguchi, who lived through both of the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

A doctoral engineering student, Mr. Fuadi was living in Simpang Mesra village, part of the Banda Aceh urban region, when a 9.1-magnitude earthquake hit the coast of Indonesia’s Sumatra island, followed by a series of giant waves that engulfed everything. “We were at my house when the quake happened,” the 39-year-old recalled. “Me, my wife and my two children escaped from the tsunami by riding a motorcycle.”

Shortly after that disaster, which killed 168,000 people, Mr. Fuadi and his family moved to Sendai, where he received a scholarship to complete his doctorate at Sendai’s Tohoku University. On March 11, 2011, he was attending a course in a three-story university building when the 9-magnitude earthquake hit, causing a tsunami that ruined the north-east coast of Japan’s main Honshu island. Fortunately, there was no significant damage to the building. The three-story dormitory building where his family lived was also undamaged. But he still feared a killer wave. “The shake was very strong and similar to the earthquake in Aceh,” Mr. Fuadi said.

“I thought a tsunami was on the way. Actually, I’m more scared of tsunamis than earthquakes.” In Sendai, though, he was safe, because the campus is 12 miles from the coast. “I feel as if my family and I are being chased by tsunamis from Aceh to Japan,” he said. “Despite what has happened, my family and I are still happy to be alive,” Mr. Fuadi said. “After all, not many people have the good luck to survive two of the biggest natural disasters recorded in history.”

Millions of Americans are living in areas at high-risk of river flooding, many of whom are completely unaware of the danger.

While the risk of coastal flooding from extreme storms and rising seas rightly attracts plenty of attention, Americans are being urged to look inland for a similar threat receiving far less recognition: river flooding. New research conducted by the University of Bristol has shown that as many as 41 million Americans are highly at risk from river floods – more than three times the number previously estimated – with real estate (住宅区) in areas such as Louisiana, Florida, Arizona and West Virginia found to be especially at threat.

For the first time, it has been possible to produce super quality flood risk maps that cover the whole United States, while previous Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) flood maps cover no more than 60 per cent of the country. The fine details provided by these new maps also makes it possible to predict the powerful effects of flooding on many smaller streams than before, thus raising concerns about the increasing number of people potentially threatened.

“We were all surprised by how many Americans we find are exposed to flooding from rivers,” says Oliver Wing, from the University of Bristol’s School of Geographical Sciences. “It’s particularly worrisome considering that most of these people aren’t even aware of the risk they face.”

Additionally, there is the possibility that this lack of awareness means construction in high-risk river flooding areas will continue to rise, despite the threats. Estimates (估量) suggest that projected population growth, continued urbanization trends (城市化趋势), and the unpredictable threats caused by climate change will leave over 60 million Americans vulnerable (易受攻击的) to a 100-year flood by the middle of the century. ‘All of this highlights the urgent need for large areas of floodplain and flood risk management planning,’ adds Wing.