welcome back to another English lesson as some of you might know I am a real English teacher in the United States and today I am filming this English lesson from my classroom hopefully the other students in other classes will not be too loud but the California wildfires have gotten worse there are now 25 people who have died and another 20 people who are missing in today's English lesson we will watch a news clip about these California fires they are going to use some Advanced vocabulary some English idioms and of course those pesky English phrasal verbs
we will watch the news together and then I will come back and teach all of the difficult terms if that sounds interesting please don't forget to hit that like button and if this is your first time here don't forget to subscribe so you never miss another English lesson now to the latest on the LA wild fires at least 25 people have died more than 20 are still missing and fire Crews have been working for more than a week but still don't have control on the two biggest fires the Palisades and Altadena so Kine is here
with us now with a closer look at the conditions and what comes next yeah guys you know the wind have been the biggest problem with these fires and thankfully they're starting to ease a little bit now the news reporter use the word ease but I want to turn that into an English phrasal verb ease up it means to become less strong or intense the firefighters hope the wind will ease up so they can control the fire the rain eased up so we were able to take take a walk take a look at that picture it
looks like a couple is enjoying a walk the pavement looks wet maybe 15 minutes before they were not able to go outside because it was raining too much but the rain eased up and they were able to go on their walk when watching the news about these wildfires I have heard the term front lines quite a bit and they use it here let's talk about what the front lines means it means the area where the most important or difficult work is happening you might hear this during a war also the firefighters on the front lines
are risking their lives to stop the fire and in the picture we just have soldiers instead of firefighters but these soldiers are on the front lines this is where most of the fighting is happening if a lot of people are getting sick you might hear front lines when it comes to doctors and nurses nurses were on the front line of the war helping sick people now to the latest on the LA Wildfire as at least 25 people have died more than 20 are still missing and fire Crews have been working for more than a week
but still don't have control on the two biggest fires the Palisades and Altadena so k Divine is here with us now with a closer look at the conditions and what comes next yeah guys you know the winds have been the biggest problem with these fires and thankfully they're starting to ease a little bit but the firefight is still far from over teams are making progress along the front lines but the two major fires the Palisades and the Altadena are still far from contained contained they are trying to contain the fire let's talk about what that
means under control or stopped from spreading the fire is now 50% contained but firefighters are still working we have some more medical stuff here doctors were able to contain the virus preventing it from spreading across the country too bad that was not true back in 2020 now here we come to this picture she can tained her excitement when she heard the good news yeah the woman in the picture looks like she wants to scream with excitement but she is keeping it contained firefight is still far from over teams are making progress along the front lines
but the two major fires the Palisades and the Altadena are still far from contained Crews also dealing with hot spots the conditions in most of these burned out communities means that more than a week after after the evacuations most families still cannot get back to their homes now in very limited areas where it is safe gas power and water crews are inspecting the lines and they're starting their repairs we have two ways that we use hotspots in English one with a fire but one in a different way we might use it with technology but with
the fire in the newscast they use it like this small areas where problems or danger still exists so if firefighters put out that's the English phrasal verb we might use if firefighters put out a house fire there still could be hotspots little parts of the fire that could reignite or start burning again even though the fire is contained there are still hot spots that could reignite and here is another way that doesn't have anything to do with with fire the park is a hot spot for tourists in the summer it's like a place where everybody
wants to go but when we talk about technology hotspot is a little different a hotspot is when a phone shares its internet connection so other devices like laptops or tablets can use it to go online I used my phone as a hotspot to conect connect my laptop to the internet while I was at the park sometimes it costs a little extra money to be able to use your phone as a hotspot but a lot of times that can come in really handy very limited they also use that term in the newscast it means not much
or very little of something very sad after a natural disaster people in the area have very limited access to clean water because of the fire take a look at this grocery store the store has very limited supplies of bread today it looks like that store has been wiped out where I live that happens quite a bit when a big snowstorm is coming everybody will go to the grocery store trying to get milk bread and eggs Cruz also dealing with hotpots the conditions in most of these burned out communities means that more than a week after
the evacuations most families still cannot get back to their homes now in very limited areas where it is safe gas power and water crews are inspecting the lines and they're starting their repairs inspecting they talked about that in the newscast too it means looking at something carefully to check for problems the team is inspecting homes to see if they are safe after the fire fire fighters might also inspect the area for hotpots the teacher inspected the students homework for mistakes a handful of those forced from their homes by the Flames are briefly coming back but
they're overwhelmed by the ruins that are left from their lives before The Firestorm when you stare at your front door that's gone and you you have the few moments to contemplate what does this really mean to my life I mean I don't fully understand everything I have is gone but you have to decide I have to make I have to find some meaning in why this happened this is a great term to know in English a hand ful what is a handful a small number or amount of something in the picture it looks like that
person has a hand full of berries like literally their hand is full of berries but how about this one she has a handful of close friends she can always trust I don't know what that number is it might be three it might be four oh no the lights just went out I need to stand up and and move so the lights will come back on yeah a handful is probably like five or less maybe six I know you can feel overwhelmed when learning English let's talk about what that is feeling like something is too much
to handle this woman looks like she is overwhelmed by her job she has so much work to do but let's talk about overwhelmed when it comes to the fire the firefighters f felt overwhelmed by the size of the fire I was overwhelmed with work and couldn't finish everything on time please let me know in the comments at work do you ever feel overwhelmed like there is not enough time to get everything done a handful of those forced from their homes by the Flames are briefly coming back but they're overwhelmed by the ruins that are left
from their lives before The Firestorm when you stare at your front door that's gone and you you have the few moments to contemplate what does this really mean to my life stare the way it's written there has something to do with the eyes you might also go up the stairs but that is spelled in a different way this is a verb it means to look at something for a long time without moving your eyes my mother always said it was rude to stare at people people stared at the destroyed buildings shocked by the damage the
baby stared at the bright light with wide eyes my eyes are not wide I would call my eyes very narrow do you know this other verb that is the opposite of stare it's glance you should never stare directly at the Sun instead I glanced at the Sun but had to look away because it was too bright when you stare at your front door that's gone and you you have the few moments to contemplate what does this really mean to my life I mean I don't fully understand everything I have is gone but you have to
decide I have to make I had to find some meaning in why this happened H contemplate contemplate that means to think deeply about something here is a sad sentence using contemplate and something about the fire she sat quietly contemplating whether to rebuild her house after the fire and it looks like this little girl is contemplating on which glasses to buy here is another sentence not about this little girl but he is contemplating moving to a new city for a better job this can be a difficult one but to find meaning means like try to find
the big idea of something let's get the official definition to understand the importance or purpose of something like you might hear in English I am trying to find the meaning of life like why are we here on this planet many people try to find the meaning of the tragedy of the Wildfire it's like asking some really big questions like maybe like is God involved in these kind of events really deep thinking a little more than contemplating after losing her job she worked hard to find meaning in her life again to me that sentence is describing
somebody who is very depressed very very sad that is it hopefully your English is so much better than before you started watching this lesson congratulations if you are looking for more English like right over there is another English lesson I did about these wildfires thanks so much for watching see you next time
