Natural disasters

Extreme weather and Natural disasters

A natural disaster is an event with a natural, as opposed to human, cause that results in large-scale loss of life or damage to property. It could be related to weather, geology, biology or even factors outside the Earth. Examples are earthquakes, hurricanes, droughts and flooding. Disease epidemics are sometimes considered natural disasters, but may be put into a different category. In some cases, natural and human factors may combine to produce a disaster.

Weather and Climate

The planet’s weather produces disasters on a fairly regular basis. Hurricanes, also known as cyclones, are among the most prominent natural disasters, occurring quite frequently in the warmer parts of the world. They begin as low-pressure areas over warm oceans and grow into giant storms, hundreds of miles in diameter that persist for several days. Their paths are fairly predictable, which gives forewarning to areas likely to be affected. Even so, they can cause substantial loss of life and millions of dollars of damage.Tornadoes cover much smaller areas and may only last for a few minutes, but during that time they can cause devastation, due to the extremely high wind speeds. In the worst category of tornado, the winds can reach 300 mph (482.8 km/h). This is enough to completely destroy brick buildings and hurl automobiles through the air. Fortunately, tornadoes of this severity are relatively rare. Much less spectacular, but much deadlier, are droughts. Many people living in drier parts of the world often rely on seasonal rainfall to grow crops. From time to time, however, the rains fail to arrive, due to fluctuations in the Earth’s climate. Prolonged lack of rainfall leads to crop failure, starvation and malnutrition, claiming millions of lives in some cases.

Excessive rainfall can cause flooding, which may result in large numbers of people losing their homes, crops being ruined or rivers bursting their banks and causing death and destruction. Flooding often results from the heavy rain that accompanies hurricanes, compounding the damage. Prolonged heavy rain can also cause disastrous landslides and mudslides.

HURACAINS

An Atlantic hurricane refers to a tropical cyclone that forms in the Atlantic Ocean usually in theNorthern Hemisphere during the summer or autumn, with one-minute maximum sustained winds of at least 74 mph (64 knots, 33 m/s, 119 km/h). When applied to hurricanes, "Atlantic" generally refers to the entire "Atlantic basin", which includes the North Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. Most Atlantic tropical storms and hurricanes form between June 1 and November 30. The United StatesNational Hurricane Center monitors the basin and gives out reports, watches and warnings about tropical weather systems for the Atlantic Basin as one of the Regional Specialized Meteorological Centers fortropical cyclones as defined by the World Meteorological Organization.

List of huracains:

GALVESTON 1900, ATLANTIC-GULF 1919,MIAMI 1926, SAN FELIPE-OKEECHOBEE 1928, FLORIDA KEYS LABOR DAY 1935, NEW ENGLAND 1938, GREAT ATLANTIC 1944, CAROL AND EDNA 1954, HAZEL 1954, CONNIE AND DIANE 1955, AUDREY 1957, DONNA 1960, CAMILLE 1969, AGNES 1972, TROPICAL STORM CLAUDETTE 1979, ALICIA 1983, GILBERT 1988, HUGO 1989, ANDREW 1992, TROPICAL STORM ALBERTO 1994, OPAL 1995, MITCH 1998, FLOYD 1999, KEITH 2000, TROPICAL STORM ALLISON 2001, IRIS 2001, ISABEL 2003, CHARLEY 2004, FRANCES 2004, IVAN 2004, JEANNE 2004, DENNIS 2005, KATRINA 2005, RITA 2005, WILMA 2005, IKE 2008

TORNADOS

A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with both the surface of the earth and a cumulonimbus

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