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Las niñas asustadas estaban llorando por el incendio.

Las niñas asustadas estaban llorando por el incendio.
The frightened girls were crying because of the fire.
From Lesson 149:The past continuous tense (estaba)·Spanish (Spain)

Questions & Answers about Las niñas asustadas estaban llorando por el incendio.

Why do we use estaban instead of estuvieron with llorando?
This lesson covers the past continuous tense, which uses the imperfect form of estar (estaban) plus the gerund (llorando). We use the imperfect because it describes an ongoing background action in the past (they were crying), rather than a completed event with a clear beginning and end.
Since Las niñas is feminine plural, why doesn't llorando change to llorandas?
The gerund (the Spanish equivalent of an -ing word, like llorando) never changes to match gender or number. It always keeps its exact same form, no matter who is doing the action.
Why does the sentence use por instead of para to mean because of?
In Spanish, por is used to show the cause or reason for an action. Since the fire is the reason the girls were crying, we use por. If you used para, it would sound like they were crying in order to create a fire!
Why does asustadas have an -as ending and come after niñas?
Descriptive adjectives like asustadas (frightened) almost always go right after the noun they describe. Because niñas is a feminine plural noun, the adjective must also take the feminine plural ending -as to match it perfectly.

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