In September 1985, more than seven decades after the Titanic was wreck

Question

In September 1985, more than seven decades after the Titanic was wrecked in the North Atlantic Ocean during its maiden voyage, a Franco-American expedition, one of the numerous expeditions launched to find the ship, found it lying at the bottom of the sea and split in two parts, disproving the theory that the ship would be found intact.

(A) parts, disproving
(B) parts, and disproving
(C) parts, which disproved
(D) parts; they disproved
(E) parts, and this disproved

(A) parts, disproving 
(B) parts, and disproving 
(C) parts, which disproved 
(D) parts; they disproved 
(E) parts, and this disproved

saarthakkhanna04 · Answer

Could someone care to explain the grammar rule behind it? I felt A is run along sentence. Thank you.

thakurarun85 · Answer

I am confused between A and B.

However

the splitting of ship disprove the theory that ship can be found intact. "and" is not required because "found it" will not help.

Hence B.

Further

"Disproving....." must modify the subject of previous statement. In such case it will also not modify the fact that the ship was split into two. Hence I have doubt on A also. Pleas help.

ShaikhMoice · Answer

Could anyone explain why E is incorrect.
TIA

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Hello  ShaikhMoice ,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, Option E is not incorrect, but it is inferior to Option A, as the construction "and this disproved" is needlessly wordy and indirect.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team

ShaikhMoice · Answer

Thnaks for the clarification.
+1 to you.

EtaCarnia · Answer

Hi ,

split in two  parts, disproving  the theory that the ship would be found intact.

Can some please explain the difference between A and C. I chose C because ,which modifies the two parts, which disproves the theory. ? Where am i going wrong.

RenB · Answer

KarishmaB   DmitryFarber   bb

Can you please explain if and how A is correct?
I thought 'disproving' is a verb modifier modifying 'lying' and 'split'. But the doer of 'lying' and 'split' is the Titanic. The doer of 'disproving' cannot be the Titanic- as in the Titanic cannot disprove a theory.
Or is it that 'disproving' modifies 'found' and 'lying' and 'split' are modifiers (participles) modifying 'it'? 
Can you please let me know where I am going wrong ?

Ishatyagi100 · Answer

Can someone explain why A is the correct answer? And is option C inferior to A?

KarishmaB · Answer

(A) parts, disproving

Present participle 'disproving' at the end and after a comma modifies the entire previous clause. 
It is the effect of what happened in the previous clause. Someone found it lying at the bottom of the sea split in two parts and this finding "disproved" the theory. The 'disproving' was the effect of the "finding." 
All ok.

(B) parts, and disproving

found it lying at the bottom ... and disproving ...
Incorrect. The ship was not disproving anything.

(C) parts, which disproved

As far as possible, we do not use 'which' for the entire previous clause. It should have a noun antecedent. In some rare cases, we do use it for a clause too, but here we have the option of using present participle which works best.

(D) parts; they disproved

The expedition is singular so use of 'they' is incorrect.
 
(E) parts, and this disproved

Not clear what does 'this' refer to. Our option (A) works much better.

Answer (A)

Vishal566 · Answer

";" Joins two independent clauses whereas a "," joins an Independent clause with a dependent clause.

As we see, the first part of the sentence is an Independent clause(Subject and Verb both are present),

D is wrong as "They" has multiple antecedents.
Eliminate.

Taking it as Cause and Effect type problem, The first part is the cause( finding the 2 parts) and the second part is its effect( cause led to the "disproving of the Theory".

The EFFECT part , after the ","comes in the Verb-ING form.

Hope this helps.

In September 1985, more than seven decades after the Titanic was wreck

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GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

In September 1985, more than seven decades after the Titanic was wreck

Prep Toolkit

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