Shadowing Practice: How China Built a Dam So Big It Slowed Down Planet Earth - Learn English Speaking with Video
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One morning, NASA scientists were sipping their coffee when they spotted something bizarre on their screens.
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The entire Earth had slowed down.
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Was it aliens or an asteroid?
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Nope.
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The culprit was engineers in China.
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They built such a wild dam across the unruly Yangtze River,
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piling so much water in one spot that our planet tilted and slowed down like someone carrying a heavy grocery bag.
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How did engineers mess with Earth's settings?
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Let's rewind to the beginning.
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Long before concrete or electricity existed, this story began with Asia's longest waterway, the mighty Yangtze River.
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Stretching 6 ,300 kilometers from freezing
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Tibetan glaciers down to the sea, its fertile banks fed Chinese dynasties for millennia.
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Yet, this generous lifeline had a nasty temper.
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Every summer, monsoon rains transformed the river into a runaway monster that swallowed farms and wiped whole towns off the map.
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4 ,000 years ago, legendary rulers like
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Yu the Great spent their entire lives digging dirt channels just to calm the river down.
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Yet, the Yangtze always struck back harder.
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In 1931 alone, relentless storms pushed the river over its banks, drowning an area the size of England.
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Millions lost their homes overnight, proving that mud levees and sandbags were no match for nature's fury.
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Back in 1919, revolutionary leader
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Sun Yat -sen stared at a narrow stretch of steep canyons called the Three Gorges and pitched an audacious idea,
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plug that rocky bottleneck with a dam to stop floods and generate electricity.
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Decades later in the 1950s, Mao Zedong swam across the Yangtze himself and wrote poems about stone walls holding back clouds,
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yet wars and poverty kept the dream on paper.
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Engineers also had terrifying reasons to think twice before blocking
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China's biggest river.
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In 1975, a super typhoon slammed central
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China and burst a smaller Bangqiao Dam, sending a wall of water through villages and claiming over 100 ,000 lives.
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Critics warned that building a far larger reservoir on the main Yangtze could become an unthinkable trap if war,
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earthquakes, or bad math ever cracked it open.
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For 40 noisy years, geologists, ecologists, and politicians argued over blueprints while testing every cliff along the canyon.
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Finally, in 1992, China's parliament put the Three Gorges project to a vote,
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sparking a rare rebellion where nearly one -third of all delegates refused to say yes.
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Even with tempers flaring, the government approved the plan.
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And in 1994, 40 ,000 workers marched then to reshape geography.
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Right out of the gate, builders faced a comical physics headache.
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How do you pour wet concrete into the middle of a roaring river without watching it wash straight into the ocean.
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Since nobody could politely ask the Yangtze to take a weekend break, crews blasted an open bypass channel along one shore,
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forcing the river to detour around the main construction zone.
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Next came an around -the -clock battle of brute force.
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Until November 1997, fleets of dump trucks hurled house -sized granite boulders into the churning water,
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pinching the river shut between two temporary stone walls called cofferdams.
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Giant pumps then sucked the trapped lagoon completely dry allowing engineers
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and muddy boots to walk across an ancient riverbed
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that hadn't seen sunlight in millions of years on
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that bare granite floor rose an absolute beast of engineering a solid gravity dam stretching 2 .3 kilometers wide
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and standing 185 meters tall instead of curving like a thin arch braced against canyon cliffs
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this wall relies on sheer stubborn weight to stand its ground packing 28 million cubic meters of concrete
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and enough structural steel to build 63 Eiffel Towers.
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Stacking that much wet cement created a sneaky chemical trap.
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As concrete hardens, internal reactions heated up like an oven to 50 degrees Celsius.
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Left alone, the core would take decades to cool and shatter like a hot glass dunked in cold water.
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So engineers blasted crushed rock with icy air before mixing, then threaded miles of cold water pipe straight through the wall like an industrial fridge.
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Of course, China didn't spend over $30 billion just to build an oversized garden fence.
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The real magic hides deep inside the dam's hollow halls.
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Workers lowered 32 enormous Francis turbines into place, each weighing hundreds of tons and wide enough to swallow a city bus.
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When plunging river water slams into those curved steel blades, raw gravity turns directly into clean electricity.
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Spinning together at peak flow, those 32 generators crank out 22 ,500 megawatts,
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matching the muscle of 22 nuclear power plants running side by side.
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Ultra -high voltage cables carry that surge over 1 ,000 kilometers east to keep neon -lit megacities like
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Shanghai humming day and night, sparing the sky tens of millions of tons of smoky coal exhaust every single year.
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Blocking China's busiest shipping lane, however, created an awkward traffic jam.
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How do 10 ,000 ton cargo freighters climb over a concrete wall as tall as a 50 -story skyscraper?
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Engineers answered by blasting a double five -level lock system straight out of solid granite mountainsides.
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Ships sail into chamber after chamber as towering steel gates swing shut, and rising water floats them upstairs over the dam.
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Climbing all five water steps takes roughly four hours which felt painfully slow for passenger ferries and urgent deliveries
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so in 2016 engineers unveiled something straight out of an animated sci -fi movie
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the world's largest ship elevator vessels weighing up to 3 000 tons float into a water -filled steel basin
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and thick cables hoist boat crew and water 113 meters vertically in 40 minutes
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While ships rode elevators up front, closing the floodgates quietly drowned an entire world upstream.
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As water climbed to 175 meters above sea level, a narrow canyon morphed into a 600 -kilometer artificial lake.
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Slowly disappearing beneath the murky green surface were 13 full -size cities, 140 towns, 1 ,300 villages,
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fertile orange groves, and cliffside temples carved 2 ,000 years ago.
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Before the waves rolled in, nearly 1 .4 million citizens had to pack their lives into cardboard boxes, watch demolition crews flatten their childhood neighborhoods,
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and move into brand new concrete towns higher up the hills.
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Meanwhile, cleanup teams raced furiously to empty more than 1 ,600 old factories, mines, and landfills sitting on the valley floor,
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before rising water turned the reservoir into chemical soup.
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When the reservoir finally topped out, 39 billion tons of water sat suspended high above sea level,
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bringing us right back to those spilled coffees at NASA.
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By lifting so much weight away from Earth's core, China triggered the exact physics of a spinning figure skater opening their arms.
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Our planet's rotation slowed, lengthening every day by 0 .06 microseconds and nudging
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Earth's axis 2 centimeters.
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Down beneath China's feet, parking 39 billion tons of liquid over ancient rock fractures came with serious side effects.
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Thousands of small tremors rattled nearby fault lines, while soggy canyon cliffs began sliding into the water.
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At the same time, the wall traps millions of tons of fertile mud each year, starving downstream wetlands and pushing rare Yangtze wildlife,
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like the smiling finless porpoise dangerously close to vanishing.
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A few years ago, internet rumors exploded when a warped satellite picture went viral,
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making the straight dam look bent like a soft noodle ready to snap.
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Space agencies quickly explained it was just a glitchy photo -stitching error from a passing satellite, not bending concrete.
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Months later in 2020, record monsoon floods slammed the reservoir at 75 million liters per second, and the wall held firm.
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Today, wild climate swings test this giant from both extremes, forcing operators to hold back angry summer floods one year,
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then ration precious water during blistering droughts the next.
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Over a century after it started as a daydream on a map, the Three Gorges Dam stands as humanity's boldest gamble with Mother Nature.
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A structure big enough to power megacities, swallow ancient history, and literally slow down planet Earth.
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Woordenschat en spreektips bij deze les
Deze spreekles is gebaseerd op de video “How China Built a Dam So Big It Slowed Down Planet Earth”. Deze woorden komen het vaakst terug: river, wall, Yangtze, dam, ton. Deze video bevat 94 zinnen en 1271 woorden om na te spreken. Het gesproken deel duurt 8:16. De spreker praat in een natuurlijk tempo van ongeveer 154 woorden per minuut, dicht bij een alledaags gesprek. Slechts 64% van de woorden hoort bij de 3.000 meest gebruikte Engelse woorden, dus de woordenschat is pittig.
Belangrijke woorden in deze video
15 woorden uit de video die het leren waard zijn, met uitspraak en betekenis:
| Woord | Uitspraak | Betekenis |
|---|---|---|
| concrete bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /ˌkɑnˈkɹit/ | concreet |
| ton zelfstandig naamwoord | /tʌn/ | ton |
| trap zelfstandig naamwoord | /tɹæp/ | val |
| meter zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈmitəɹ/ | meter, teller |
| canyon zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈkænjən/ | kloof |
| reservoir zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈɹɛz.ə(ɹ).vwɑɹ/ | reservoir |
| stretch werkwoord | /stɹɛt͡ʃ/ | strekken |
| flood zelfstandig naamwoord | /flʌd/ | overstroming, vloed |
| climb werkwoord | /ˈklaɪ̯m/ | klimmen |
| cliff zelfstandig naamwoord | /klɪf/ | klip, klif |
| granite zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈɡɹæn.ɪt/ | graniet |
| fertile bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /ˈfɝːtəl/ | vruchtbaar |
| chamber zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈt͡ʃeɪ̯mbɚ/ | slaapkamer |
| gate zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈɡeɪ̯t/ | poort |
| narrow bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /ˈnæɹəʊ/ | nauw, smal |
Phrasal verbs die je zult horen
| Woord | Betekenis |
|---|---|
| slow down werkwoord | afremmen |
Uitspraak om op te letten
- De “th”-klanken: beneath /bɪˈniːθ/, thin /ˈθɪn/, thick /θɪk/, mathematics /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/
- De klanken “sh” en “zh”: shore /ʃɔɹ/, artificial /ˌɑː.tɪˈfɪʃ.əl/, structural /ˈstɹʌk(t͡)ʃəɹəl/, crush /kɹʌʃ/, revolutionary /ˌɹɛvəˈluʃənɛɹi/
- Lange woorden — let op de klemtoon: electricity /ɪˌlɛkˈtɹɪsɪti/, temporary /ˈtɛmp(əˌɹ)ɛɹi/, operator /ˈɑpəˌɹeɪtɚ/, artificial /ˌɑː.tɪˈfɪʃ.əl/, legendary /ˈlɛd͡ʒ.ənˌdɛɹ.i/
Klanken die Nederlandstaligen lastig vinden:
- Stemhebbende eindmedeklinker — /b/, /d/, /g/, /z/, /v/ niet verscherpen: flood /flʌd/, bend /bɛnd/, cloud /ˈklaʊ̯d/, liquid /ˈlɪk.wɪd/, slide /ˈslaɪ̯d/
- /æ/ — opener dan de Nederlandse “e”: trap /tɹæp/, canyon /ˈkænjən/, granite /ˈɡɹæn.ɪt/, narrow /ˈnæɹəʊ/, satellite /ˈsætəlaɪ̯t/
- /g/ — een harde plofklank, geen Nederlandse “g”: granite /ˈɡɹæn.ɪt/, gate /ˈɡeɪ̯t/, gravity /ˈɡɹævɪti/, argue /ˈɑɹ.ɡju/, trigger /ˈtɹɪɡɚ/
Zo oefen je met deze video
- Luister de hele video één keer zonder te spreken en noteer de woorden die je niet kent.
- Begin op 0,75× snelheid, spreek zin voor zin na en ga terug naar normale snelheid zodra het makkelijk gaat.
- Neem jezelf op en vergelijk met het origineel; let daarbij op woorden als concrete, ton, trap.
Wat is de Shadowing-techniek?
Shadowing is een wetenschappelijk onderbouwde taalleermethode die oorspronkelijk is ontwikkeld voor professionele tolkentraining en gepopulariseerd door polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. De methode is eenvoudig maar krachtig: je luistert naar native Engelse audio en herhaalt het onmiddellijk hardop — als een schaduw die de spreker volgt met slechts 1–2 seconden vertraging. In tegenstelling tot passief luisteren of grammaticadrills, dwingt shadowing je hersenen en mondspieren om echte spraakpatronen tegelijkertijd te verwerken en te reproduceren. Onderzoek toont aan dat het de uitspraaknauwkeurigheid, intonatie, ritme, verbonden spraak, luisterbegrip en spreekvaardigheid aanzienlijk verbetert — waardoor het een van de meest effectieve methoden is voor IELTS Speaking-voorbereiding en echte Engelse communicatie.