The big helicopter was hot as a tin-roof shack under the tropical sun. Two thousand feet below, the South China Sea sparkled gray-green. Overhead, the rotor whacked and thudded, vibrating the whole machine like an overpowered hot rod. It would take an hour to get there, they said, to fly 120 miles on a line from the east coast of Malaysia.

We were looking for a big iron platform on the sea, a sea monster larger than Moby Dick, standing on four colossal legs implanted on the ocean floor. It was a $10 million perch on which men lived and worked. The thing had a name: North Star. It had a purpose: to explore for oil beneath the waters of the ocean.

Q. Underline a sentence which supports the answer to question No. 1.