1Gerry Drives a Digger. His Employer Tells Him to Wear Ear Protectors

HELP

1Gerry drives a digger. His employer tells him to wear ear protectors.

aWhat do ear protectors actually do to the sound?

bWhat might happen to Gerry, if he does not wear the protectors?

cThe noise from a road drill is about 110 decibels. Some discos play music at 110 decibels.

iWhat advice would you give to a man operating a road drill?

iiWhat advice would you give to a friend who often goes to discos?

CORE

2Look carefully at this picture.

aMake a list of all the objects that would create sounds that could damage your ears.

bMake another list of the sounds that are unlikely to damage your ears.

This worksheet may have been altered from the original on the CD-ROM.

cImagine you live in a house beneath the flight path of the jet aircraft.

iList two things you could do to reduce the effect of the engine noise as the planes take off and land.

iiSuggest one thing that the airport could do to try to reduce the nuisance that the aircraft create.

dBarry runs a pub in a residential area. Bands play there three nights a week. The local residents have complained.

iSuggest two specific reasons why the residents have complained. You need to say more than just “it is too noisy”.

iiSuggest two things Barry could do to keep the bands while making the residents happier.

EXTENSION

3Salmon is an expensive fish. In Scotland, poachers sometimes use explosive charges, which they put into the water to kill the salmon. The explosion kills all the salmon over quite a long stretch of the river. It is even more effective if the fish are kept in large cages on a salmon farm.

aRoughly how many decibels might be produced by an explosive charge?

bIn naval warfare, submariners worry about special explosives called depth charges. Suggest what depth charges might be and why they worry submariners.

cMalcolm is trying to outwit the poachers on his salmon farm. He has surrounded the salmon cages with thick rubber sheets. The sheets have a pattern of holes in them.

iExplain why rubber sheets might reduce the number of fish that are killed, in a poaching attack using explosive charges.

iiWhy must the sheet contain holes?

4Brian is a tank commander in the ‘Desert Rats’. He always wears ear protectors when he is in the tank.

aSuggest two sources of noise that Brian should be protected from, when he is in the tank.

bBrian must talk to the tank driver, who has very restricted vision. Suggest how they can talk to each other when they are both wearing ear protectors.

This worksheet may have been altered from the original on the CD-ROM.