U.S. & Canada Power Outage Leaves Millions in Dark

　　　【参考译文】美加停电使数百万人处于黑暗之中

　　NEW YORK (Reuters) - The blackout in North American plunged the streets of New York and other major U.S. and Canadian cities into darkness, forcing millions to spend a night in the sweltering summer heat without air conditioning, lights or television.

　　【参考译文】纽约(路透社)美国北部的大面积停电使得纽约和其他美国大城市以及加拿大一些城市街道一片黑暗，数百万的市民不得不在没有空调、电灯和电视的情况下度过闷热的夏夜。

　　【讲解】在这里引用一下中国日报新闻词汇对blackout的解释，这个词的基本的意思是停电a period of darkness caused by a failure of the electric power supply。“blackout”还可以解释为短时的知觉丧失a loss of consciousness for a short time，例如：She had a blackout after the accident and couldn't remember what had happened.事故发生后她一时昏了过去，记不得当时出了什么事。

　　plunge，To cast suddenly, violently, or deeply into a given state or situation.使突然陷入，突然地、猛烈地或深深地投进一种特定的状态或情形：the street was plunged in cool shadow.街道突然陷入荫凉之中。

　　More than 12 hours after the power outage began at about 4 P.M. EDT, most of New York was pitch black and only a few sections of the nation's largest city had electricity. Thousands of commuters, who were unable to make it home, slept in the streets of Manhattan. Authorities were unsure what caused the power outage, except to say it was not the work of saboteurs. Some blamed the outage on North America's aging electricity transmission grid, which saw its greatest expansion in the years following World War II.

　　【参考译文】美国东部时间14日下午4点大面积停电后12个多小时内，纽约绝大部分地方一片漆黑，只少数地方还有电力照明。成千上万的乘客由于无法回家而露宿曼哈顿街头。美官方还未确定停电原因，但否认停电与恐怖活动有关。一些人指责事故原因是北美老化的电路传输网，这家公司自二战以来一直进行大规模的线路扩充。

　　【讲解】pitch在本文中的意思是Any of various thick, dark, sticky substances obtained from the distillation residue of coal tar, wood tar, or petroleum and used for waterproofing, roofing, caulking, and paving.沥青。as black as pitch是习惯用语，意思是漆黑的，所以pitch black的意思也是漆黑。

　　commuter在美语里指One that travels regularly from one place to another, as from suburb to city and back.通勤者,经常(乘火车)往返者；使用月(季)票乘车者。urban commuter，市区定期票旅客；commuter movement，(近郊)经常［长期车票］客流；commuter time，上下班时间。

　　sabotage，Treacherous action to defeat or hinder a cause or an endeavor; Deliberate subversion.暗中破坏，故意捣乱。saboteur，One that commits sabotage.蓄意破坏者。The soldiers shot the three saboteurs.士兵们击毙了那3名破坏者。

　　Bush vowed that the government would investigate what caused the outage and promised to prevent a recurrence.

　　【参考译文】布什表示政府会调查停电原因，防止停电事件再次发生。

　　【讲解】recurrence，再现；重现。More care in the future will prevent recurrence of the mistake.将来的小心可防止错误的重现。习惯用语have recurrence to是罕见语，用来作求助于...,求援于...,依靠...讲。