Q 01/05

Which name is given to the carved river rocks in Central Europe that only surface when a drought drops the water?

A) Mourning stones

B) Thirst stones

C) Hunger stones

D) Plague stones

Answer · why

C) Hunger stones

Hunger stones were carved during past droughts to warn later generations that famine follows low water. One in the Elbe at Děčín tells whoever can rea...

Q 02/05

In which country do droughts expose the Dolmen of Guadalperal, a 5,000-year-old monument drowned by a reservoir?

A) Spain

B) Portugal

C) Ireland

D) France

Answer · why

A) Spain

Spain flooded the monument in 1963 when it filled the Valdecañas reservoir on the Tagus. Its likeness to a famous English ring of stones earned it the...

Q 03/05

Which South African city came close to Day Zero, the day its taps would be shut off, in a 2018 drought?

A) Durban

B) Pretoria

C) Johannesburg

D) Cape Town

Answer · why

D) Cape Town

Cape Town would have been the first major city in the world to run dry. Residents were limited to 50 litres a day each, and winter rain refilled the d...

Q 04/05

Which African fish survives droughts by burrowing into mud and sleeping for months inside a cocoon of dried mucus?

A) Mudskipper

B) Lungfish

C) Tigerfish

D) Nile perch

Answer · why

B) Lungfish

Lungfish can breathe air, so they outlast a dried-up pond that kills other fish. Their line is older than the dinosaurs, with fossils reaching back mo...

Q 05/05

Which novelist's brother discovered that silver iodide could seed clouds, a rainmaking tool still tried in droughts?

A) Ray Bradbury

B) Joseph Heller

C) Kurt Vonnegut

D) Norman Mailer

Answer · why

C) Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut later gave the crystal structure of ice a starring role in his novel Cat's Cradle. His brother Bernard found the compound at his desk in...