A verb tense question tests when something happens, using clues around a blank. Check that each choice agrees with the subject, then find the time clues and work out the order of events. The simple present describes facts or habits, and the present perfect connects past events to now. The past perfect continuous describes ongoing work before a past moment, while the simple past passive shows what was done to the subject. Test each form against the timeline and who does the work, not how natural it sounds.
Hints
- Hint 1
Look at the time words around the blank, including the length of time and the storm's arrival.
- Hint 2
Place both events on a timeline. Does the storm arrive in the past or the present, and when does the monitoring happen in relation to it?
Step-by-step
Follow the time clues
Step 1Check who does the monitoring
The coastal engineers names more than one person, and every choice agrees with that subject. Who does the monitoring? The engineers watch the seawall, so the engineers must do the work. The form were monitored instead makes the engineers the ones being watched and leaves no place for the seawall after the verb. Time will decide among forms that describe the engineers doing the monitoring.
- Step 2
Place the monitoring before the storm
When did the engineers do that work? The words before the first major storm of the season struck give us a later event, and struck puts that event in the past. The monitoring ran for several months, so it wasn't a single brief act. It was already going on during the months leading up to the storm, which let the engineers find and repair weak points. We need a stretch of monitoring earlier than a past event, not monitoring tied to the present.
- Step 3
Match the verb form to the timeline
To describe ongoing work before a later past moment, we use had been plus the -ing form of the verb. Monitor states a present fact or habit, while have monitored links earlier work to now rather than to the storm. Had been monitoring shows work continuing over time and puts it before the storm, as for several months before calls for. Choice C.