Select the connective that completes the inverted sentence:
Hardly had the research submarine reached the abyssal seabed _____ its sonar sensors detected a hydrothermal vent.
Answer and explanation
Correct answer: B. when
- Step 1: Identify the negative correlative construction: 'Hardly had [subject] [past participle]' standardly pairs with 'when' (or 'before').
- Step 2: Complete the sentence: 'Hardly had the research submarine reached the abyssal seabed when its sonar sensors detected...'.
Answer
when.
Why not the others: 'than' is exclusively paired with 'no sooner'; 'then' is a temporal sequence adverb and not a correlative subordinator; 'that' introduces complement or relative clauses, not correlative temporal clauses.
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