Read this excerpt from the great fire. as the rest of the city went about its business, fireman dorsey was racing through the streets to the closest signal box, which happened to be at goll's drugstore. he opened the small door on the box and used his thumb to pull down the lever. dorsey then headed back to the scene of the fire, not realizing that he'd made a mistake — he had forgotten to pull down the lever four times, a special signal that would have made it a true second alarm. at the courthouse, schaffer and brown would hear dorsey's alarm, but, assuming it was simply another signal telling them about the original fire, they failed to call out more engines. how does this excerpt support the main idea of the passage?
a) it illustrates how many mistakes firefighter dorsey made during the course of the fire.
b) it demonstrates how the city’s fire alarm system and signal boxes worked.
c) it describes one of the key mistakes that prevented the fire from being extinguished sooner.
d) it highlights the fact that bruno goll was responsible for the fire and stopped it from being put out.

The correct answer to the question: How does this excerpt support the main idea of the passage, would be, C: It describes one of the key mistakes that prevented the fire from being extinguished sooner.

Explanation:

"The Great Fire" is a children´s story that was written by Jim Murphy and which was published in 1996. The story narrates the events of the Great Chicago Fire of 1781 and the events before, during and after. In this particular excerpt the story is narrating what happened during one of the many fires that started to spring after the original one had started, and how the different errors that several people, particularly firefighters, committed because they were misled, or misinformed, helped the fire to become even more destructive than it had originally been. According to the story, one of the key points as to why the fire spread and caused so much destruction was that the firefighters were mislocated and misinformed and therefore the efforts were wrongly placed. Here, Dorsey becomes part of that trend of mislocation and because of that the other firefighters do not understand the urgency of the situation signaled by Dorsey and do not send the necessary support.

The correct answer is C The fire started spreading more quickly through the city.

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