English 中文网 漫画网 爱新闻iNews 翻译论坛
中国网站品牌栏目(频道)
当前位置: Language Tips> Audio & Video> 新闻播报> Normal Speed News VOA常速

Some western workhorses don't eat hay

[ 2010-04-02 13:34]     字号 [] [] []  
免费订阅30天China Daily双语新闻手机报:移动用户编辑短信CD至106580009009

Some western workhorses don't eat hay

Throughout the scraggliest parts of the American West, in fields where jackrabbits keep company with rattlesnakes, you see symbols of an earlier era of prosperity.

Often rusted, but sometimes new and shiny, they look like tireless grasshoppers, bobbing up and down, up and down, up and down across the landscape. Sometimes you'll see a lone one in an unlikely place, such as the parking lot of a shopping mall, the middle of a wheatfield, or out by the clothesline in someone's backyard.

Some western workhorses don't eat hay

They go tha-thump, tha-thump, tha-thump, day and night.

These are motor-driven oil pumps, whose proper name is hydraulic pumping unit. Most people call them pumpjacks, horseheads or - our favorite - nodding donkeys because they look like a pack animal, lazily reaching down for a snatch of grass and then raising its head again.

Pumpjacks are not an explorer's device. They show up long after someone else has prodded the earth and struck oil, long after pent-up natural gas has pushed the oil to the surface in a great geyser, and long after someone capped the gusher and began to harvest the oil. In states like Oklahoma and Texas, where decaying, 100-million-year-old plant and animal debris had turned to oil under the compressed rock, fortunes were made and huge companies founded off this liquid black gold.

Some western workhorses don't eat hay

But when the natural gas is gone, and big platform rigs have finished sucking out the easy-to-reach oil, landowners set out pumpjacks to tap the oil that still oozes through the rocks below - like the moisture you can find in a sponge that's been squeezed.

With one or a few of these horseheads a-pumping, pulling oil into retaining tanks to await shipment to market, families can collect enough barrels of oil to make some extra money.

Pumpjacks can rise and dip day after day without ceasing. But most U.S. states force their owners to stagger the hours of pumping, for fear the vast fields below will be depleted. So don't be fooled if you see an old nodding donkey standing idle, rusting in the sun. It could just be waiting its turn.

jackrabbit: a large N American hare(= an animal like a large rabbit) with very long ears 杰克兔(北美野兔)

clothesline:晒衣绳

hydraulic: (of water, oil, etc.) moved through pipes, etc. under pressure(水、油等)(通过水管等)液压的,水力的

pumpjack: the ground-based drive for a submerged pump in an oil borehole 抽油机械

geyser: a spring that discharges hot water and steam 热喷泉

Related stories:

Know where the 'swamp thing' monster came from?

In one downtown's shadow, life moves slowly

A museum better known as the US Capitol

Death Valley: a beautiful but dangerous place

(来源:VOA 编辑:陈丹妮)

 
中国日报网英语点津版权说明:凡注明来源为“中国日报网英语点津:XXX(署名)”的原创作品,除与中国日报网签署英语点津内容授权协议的网站外,其他任何网站或单位未经允许不得非法盗链、转载和使用,违者必究。如需使用,请与010-84883631联系;凡本网注明“来源:XXX(非英语点津)”的作品,均转载自其它媒体,目的在于传播更多信息,其他媒体如需转载,请与稿件来源方联系,如产生任何问题与本网无关;本网所发布的歌曲、电影片段,版权归原作者所有,仅供学习与研究,如果侵权,请提供版权证明,以便尽快删除。
 

关注和订阅

人气排行

翻译服务

中国日报网翻译工作室

我们提供:媒体、文化、财经法律等专业领域的中英互译服务
电话:010-84883468
邮件:translate@chinadaily.com.cn