6 of the World’s Deadliest Natural Disasters

Major flood events along the Yangtze River (Chang Jiang) in central and eastern China have occurred from ancient times to the present, causing considerable destruction of property and many casualties, but the major flood of 1931 stands out. It covered tens of thousands of square miles, flooding rice fields and various cities, including Nanjing and Wuhan. The flood affected more than 50 million people. Government organizations, including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, estimated the death toll to have been about 3.7 million people.

On January 12, 2010, an earthquake hit Haiti about 15 miles (24 kilometers) southwest of the capital city, Port-au-Prince. The earthquake registered a magnitude of 7.0 on the Richter scale and was followed by aftershocks that registered magnitudes of 5.9 and 5.5. Another aftershock of magnitude 5.9 struck on January 20. The earthquake was generated by contractional deformation along the Léogâne fault, a small hidden thrust fault discovered underneath the city of Léogâne. There has been debate about the total number of deaths caused by this earthquake, but estimates suggest that about 200,000–300,000 people died. Hundreds of thousands more were displaced.

Typhoon Nina struck western Henan province of China in August 1975. The typhoon caused a catastrophic dam failure, and the ensuing floods caused more than 150,000 casualties. The Banqiao Dam had been built in the early 1950s in an effort to control the Huang He (Yellow River), but Typhoon Nina produced floods twice as intense as the flood levels the dam was able to withstand. According to death toll reports, at least 26,000 people died in the floods. An estimated 145,000 people died from epidemics caused by water contamination and famine. The number of people affected by the disaster exceeded 10,000,000.

An earthquake with a magnitude of 7.9 struck the Tokyo-Yokohama metropolitan area about noon on September 1, 1923. The death toll from the temblor was estimated to have exceeded 140,000. Most of those deaths were caused by subsequent widespread fires. Many hundreds of thousands of houses were either shaken down or burned, and the shock generated a tsunami that reached a height of 39.5 feet (12 metres) at the city of Atami, on the Sagami Gulf. The earthquake and its aftermath destroyed the largest commercial center of Japan and traumatized the nation for decades.

On October 8, 2005, a disastrous earthquake struck the Pakistan-administered portion of the Kashmir region, the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan, and adjacent parts of India and Afghanistan. The earthquake was measured at a magnitude of 7.6, and the relief effort for the survivors was hampered by numerous aftershocks, ensuing landslides, and falling rocks. The severity of the damage and the high number of fatalities were exacerbated by poor construction in the affected areas. In Kashmir at least 79,000 people were killed, and more than 32,000 buildings collapsed.

The Great Galveston Storm occurred on September 8, 1900, when a hurricane with an estimated strength of Category 4 hit Galveston, Texas. This hurricane remains the deadliest natural disaster in U.S. history, as well as the worst hurricane in U.S. history. More than 8,000 people were killed, and 10,000 were left homeless. The hurricane decimated Galveston, which at the time was one of the most advanced cities in Texas. The hurricane had an estimated tidal surge of 15 feet (4.5 meters), while the barrier island of Galveston was only 5 feet (1.5 meters) above sea level. It struck without much warning, as storm forecasting at the time lacked the advanced technology necessary to accurately predict the enormous physical and human toll the hurricane would take.