Talk:Natural disaster/Archive 1

Old comment
Some ideas for possible addition: user:mirwin
 * algae blooms (red tides)?
 * landslide
 * ice age -- perhaps compare with nuclear winter
 * drought
 * desertification -- both manmade and natural
 * plague
 * (locusts:ecological infestation or inbalance?)
 * disease such as black plague, tuberculosis, etc.

Mistyping
"Very deadly, kills trillions of people every year" seems to be a mistyping.... -- Hendrick

I think it's a good idea to compile a list of natural disaster. --Lorenzarius

I am feeling generous today, so I am going to write a small description of each disaster, including an example (hopefully one that exists in Wikipedia) to illustrate better. I have a background in weather, and several books on disasters lying on my floor, could be a bit of work. RyanGerbil10 23:39, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Removal
I removed the following text:


 * Phase one. Favorable conditions. At this level a collection of natural events which are normally too diparate for the non-specialist to notice begins to form a system that can threaten property and life.


 * Phase two. Anticipation and prediction. This is when all possible directions and developments are mentioned and explored. Preparedness of local governments and agencies are emphasized and catalogued. The instructional mode begins in media outlets.


 * Phase three. Prediction and preparedness. Authority presents a clear picture of what is expected, also re-states the fact that these systems are unpredictable. Instructional mode is shifted into high gear and detailed lists are generated along with advice given by official organizations via news personalities. This phase is also marked by the relational contact phenomenon in which family and friends outside of the predicted zone make contact with those within the area to be affected. Concern is expressed.


 * Phase four. Disruption of civilized activity, hoarding of resources. Commercial activity increases to a fever pitch. Much news is made about the scarcity of supplies, which in turn, increases commercial activity. Announcements are made regarding the interruption of normal government services. Most individuals are now staying at home or other places of refuge.


 * Phase five. The event. The natural disaster occurs. (Note. this is "Phase one" for sudden disasters such as earthquakes and some volcanoes) This is generally marked by some loss of communication between individual groups. It is common for groups to periodically or continually use municipal resources like telephone, electricity and water to check for continued availability.


 * Phase six. Aftermath. Quantification, explanation. One of the first ways the disaster is measured is in loss of life, soon followed by the financial tally. Insurance companies usually fold or limit liability. Stories are told and begin to circulate. Data is compiled and evaluated to help in the preparation for the next occurrence. Relational contact is highly active as facilities permit. Reconstruction begins.

It didn't seem to make a lot of sense, or flow with the article--it had non-encyclopedic writing. I'll rewrite a stub quickly, but this article needs expansion

Worst Natural Disasters
Is there a list of the world's worst natural disasters here ?

If not, there should be

I have created one, at Worst Natural Disasters

A type of natural disaster not yet listed in the article
What about the type of plague that isn't a disease epidemic, but a swarm of locusts, ants, mice, etc. The term plague is used to refer to these, but this overlaps heavily with "epidemic". Is there a name or category by which these swarming events are referred to which does not include disease-based plagues? --Go for it! 19:57, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Bibliography and misued terminology
There are references in the text, but I cannot find the actual bibliography. The list of hazards isn't complete, it lacks seiches and deep lake gas releases. More importantly, there is a definite confusion of terminology here. This is a list of natural hazards. Natural hazards can result natural disasters. E.g. s tsunami is a natural hazard, the boxing day tsunami was a natural disaster. --Drdan 09:15, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

List of doomsday scenarios
Could use votes to save this article, thanks MapleTree 22:30, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Adding news and information links
A good page and I am sure that there are good reasons for disabling it. However, I think that it might be useful to add a couple of emergency news and information links like: AlertNet ReliefWeb which give reports of breaking and ongoing natural disasters.Joel Mc 16:27, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

What Is Your Story?
Natural Disasters

Have you ever been involved in a natural disaster? Type it in and share your story with many other people!! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 151.204.18.17 (talk) 20:26, 13 February 2007 (UTC).

Why are supervolcanos separate
Shouldn't supervolcanos be included in the volcano section? --  rxnd  ( t  |  &#8364;  |  c  ) 11:29, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

There is no such thing as a "Natural Disaster"
The UNISDR's definition of "Disaster" is accepted as the international standard, defined as "A serious disruption of the functioning of a community or a society involving widespread human, material, economic or environmental losses and impacts, which exceeds the ability of the affected community or society to cope using its own resources. " Their definition for "Hazard" is also accepted as the international standard, defined as "A dangerous phenomenon, substance, human activity or condition that may cause loss of life, injury or other health impacts, property damage, loss of livelihoods and services, social and economic disruption, or environmental damage. " This article uses "disaster" when it should be "hazard".

Divinasabino (talk) 19:46, 28 June 2014 (UTC)


 * I don't follow you at all. How does the above defintion for "disaster" differ from what is stated in the article?


 * The above definition for "hazard" differs in that includes the key word "may", which is ambiguous. Here it means "can potentially". It seems you might be misinterpreting the word "may" to mean "possibly include". -- Racer X11 Talk to me Stalk me  20:31, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I think this has now been addressed with the reworking of the lead and terminology section. EMsmile (talk) 09:15, 8 June 2022 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Natural disaster. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20110804064530/http://www.nasca.org.uk:80/Strange_Maps/solar/Solar_Flare/solar_flare.html to http://www.nasca.org.uk/Strange_Maps/solar/Solar_Flare/solar_flare.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Cheers. —cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 15:17, 28 August 2015 (UTC)

Protection request on 10 October 2015
Since it contains other protected sites within it. — 73.47.37.131 (talk)


 * ❌. Wrong venue: file a request at WP:RFPP; that's the only place where administrators will be looking for protection requests. Altamel (talk) 21:19, 10 October 2015 (UTC)

I need some help
Is there a link to a shortened version someone might have so I can use it for a slides I am making We are attempting to save wikipedia (talk) 00:34, 27 May 2016 (UTC)


 * There is always this, or actually putting in some work extracting the information you need.  Velella  Velella Talk 08:30, 27 May 2016 (UTC) the

What was the first natural disaster in the world?
Hi im just asking what is the first natural disaster in the world?

Please tell me.
 * ) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.111.254.248 (talk) 11:26, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Natural disaster. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080811021537/http://www.em-dat.net/ to http://www.em-dat.net/

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 17:58, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Natural disaster. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20070824054504/http://amsglossary.allenpress.com/glossary/search?id=flood1 to http://amsglossary.allenpress.com/glossary/search?id=flood1
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20070205124033/http://www.cswr.org/dow/dow.htm to http://cswr.org/dow/DOW.htm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 23:41, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

Revisiting the "Natural" nature of natural disasters
Human activities and political situations absolutely affect whether a natural event becomes a disaster. We don't consider explosive eruptions in deserted areas of Kamchatka to be disasters. Deforestation can actually make mudslides possible where they wouldn't otherwise occur. Political unrest can turn a difficult situation into a catastrophic one. The role of human choices in the occurrence and magnitude of natural disasters needs to be discussed on this page.

I am not advocating a change in the designation of "natural" or that we combine this page with other disaster pages. The term "natural disaster" is well known by the general public, and is still appropriate, since the impetus for these events is still a natural occurrence, such as excessive rainfall or an earthquake. But the human role in mitigating or exacerbating the damage caused cannot be ignored. Elriana (talk) 20:23, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Hi Elriana, I've reworked the lead and terminology section along the lines that you have suggested. Please advise if you feel it's better now or if we need more text and better references to explain this? EMsmile (talk) 09:16, 8 June 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 6 July 2019
Add: A resilient community is one that has prepared for, and can thus absorb, recover from, and adapt to the disruptive event. Alnj (talk) 21:40, 6 July 2019 (UTC)


 * ❌ for several reasons:
 * You haven't said where you want to add this.
 * See WP:SELFCITE for some guidance about citing your own works.
 * arXiv is only a preprint server, so things only sourced from there aren't necessarily reliable sources.
 * The paper you provide doesn't even seem to contain a definition like this.
 * There's already similar information in the lead paragraph of the article, so I'm not sure what would be gained from adding this anyway.
 * –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 21:56, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

Rephrasing the "disproportionate impact" section
While the content of this section does hold water, I feel that it could be improved by expanding the focus slightly from just women to all social groups. The current section even mentions immigrants and the LGBT community in one subsection, but continues to focus solely on women. Re-titling the section to something such as "Adverse Effects" would allow for additional information on other demographics to be included. Plenty of other social groups are subject to increased violence in times of disaster. I know it was manmade, but the evidence speaks for itself when you take a look at the vitriol against Middle-eastern ethnicities in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. These are just a few examples but I assume that others will come to mind just reading this. Digman14 (talk) 04:50, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Change below
A landslide is described as an outward and downward slope movement of an abundance of slope-forming materials including rock, soil, artificial, or even a combination of these things

to

A landslide is described as an outward and downward slope movement of an abundance of slope-forming materials including rock, soil, artificial fill, or even a combination of these things
 * OK, I've made that change now (added the word "fill"). EMsmile (talk) 09:26, 8 June 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 26 August 2020
Add a new section with the headline "Campaign to recognise disasters as non-natural in origin" and the following text: Several academics, practitioners, policymakers and community groups have used the #NoNaturalDisasters Twitter account, hashtag and consolidated online campaign (launched in June 2018) to inform and educate people and/ or organisations within the disaster risk sector that using ‘natural’ to describe disasters was incorrect.

Since its launch, the campaign has grown to include a dedicated website, thousands of followers on multiple platforms and citations in mainstream media articles.

The advocates of this campaign use social media platforms to share the position:

If we recognise and accept the standard definition of disaster as a serious disruption of the functioning of a community or a society at any scale due to hazardous events interacting with conditions of exposure, vulnerability and capacity, then we must consider human involvement at the core of that process.

A hazard will only become a disaster should it impact the workings of a society or community. As such, a disaster can only happen where a society or community exists. When a hazard reaches an area of human habitation, policies including decisions around the built environment and social welfare can increase the impacts of that hazard. What’s worse, using ‘natural’ to describe disasters misleads people to think the devastating results are inevitable, out of our control, and are simply part of a natural process. Hazards (earthquakes, hurricanes, pandemics, drought etc) are inevitable but the impact they have on society is not.

This campaign aims to halt decades of using incorrect terminology and to highlight the implications of using such terminology. NoNaturalDisasters (talk) 17:41, 26 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. &mdash; KuyaBriBri Talk 23:03, 26 August 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 26 August 2020
One of the most salient facts people should know but don't know is that deaths from natural disasters are at 100-year low, and the first half of 2020 saw the lowest number of disaster deaths in human history.

I would propose a paragraph at the top of the page consisting of the following:

Deaths from natural disasters are at 100-year low, despite a quadrupling of the human population during the same period. In the decade of the 1920s, disasters killed 5 million people, whereas in the 2010s, just 0.4 million did. The first half of 2020 saw the lowest number of disaster deaths in human history. EnvironmentExpert (talk) 18:47, 26 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: Although this appears at first glance to be well sourced (apart from the Tweet: see WP:TWITTER); I am declining this request for now because there doesn't appear to be a consensus to insert this into the lead paragraph. Please see this page for more on how to build consensus.  Seagull123  Φ  16:02, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 18 January 2022
In the introduction, please change "effected" to "affected". "Effected" is the past tense of "effect", e.g. "He effected a change", not an adjective as it's used in this sentence. 122.150.71.249 (talk) 20:27, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
 * ✅ thank you! Extraordinary Writ (talk) 21:09, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Mention climate change in its own sub-heading?
I see the article mentions climate change once in the lead and once in the main text. I feel that is insufficient. It's probably more appropriate to have a separate sub-heading on climate change and how it relates to the frequency and intensity of many natural disasters, in particular floods and many of the "meteorological disasters", as well as wildfires. Or has this already been discussed many times before on this talk page (I couldn't see it at first glance)? (of course I wouldn't add anything without reliable sources; those could probably be taken from the FA-article on climate change). EMsmile (talk) 04:25, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

The "Disproportionate impact on women" is irrelevant
It is obvious that all natural disasters will more heavily impact weaker individuals, but the section focuses only on women for no good reason. It should either become more relevant and give a general perspective on the impacts of those disasters on weaker populations, or simply be removed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.236.250.88 (talk) 02:38, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I agree that we should add content on the impacts of disasters on weaker populations in general (e.g. the poor, youth, elderly, indigenous peoples) and probably compress the current content about the impacts on women, or move some of that to a sub-article. EMsmile (talk) 04:20, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

Question regarding terminology: Natural Disaster vs. Natural Hazard
The question regarding terminology needs resolution in this article. Natural hazards are what can cause disasters. In principle the term natural disasters is a misnomer. See this article on the Prevention Web (UNDRR's knowledge site) "It's Time to Say Goodbye to 'Natural' Disasters" https://www.preventionweb.net/experts/oped/view/72768#:~:text=United%20Nations%20Office%20for%20Disaster%20Risk%20Reduction%20(UNDRR),agencies%2C%20NGOs%20and%20many%20others. We need a better link between the Natural Disaster article and the one on Natural Hazard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_hazard. The implications of getting these terms right can be significant when it comes to reinsurance, spreading of risk, risk reduction, disaster management, impacts on land use and climate change adaptation. ASRASR (talk) 12:37, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
 * ASRASR, could you please clarify your proposal? Are you talking about merging or moving some content from one to the other? EMsmile (talk) 04:23, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Also, just wanted to mention that a similar proposal was made a year ago on the talk page of natural hazard, see here. EMsmile (talk) 04:33, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Note the Sustainable Development Goals' targets and indicators mention "disaster" 25 times, but "natural disaster" only once, see here. EMsmile (talk) 04:41, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
 * And lastly, we would also need to review the information at disaster where that same distinction is made between "natural disaster" and "human made disaster". I am not an expert but for example "floods" and "wildfires" should be a mixture of natural and human made, shouldn't they? Also landslides often have a lot of "human causes". EMsmile (talk) 04:44, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
 * , the proposal is to add a small amount of text in both WP articles explaining that the term "natural disasters" is strictly speaking a misnomer and that disasters can be caused by "natural hazards". The text can be based on the UNDRR article linked just above. ASRASR (talk) 12:04, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
 * OK, I see you have done that now, good. EMsmile (talk) 09:27, 8 June 2022 (UTC)

Other natural disasters
Are dust storms and firestorms (like the one in sodom and Gomorrah) natural disasters? Zachbarbo (talk) 17:19, 19 June 2021 (UTC)
 * I would say a dust storm is a natural disaster and so are wildfires. I am not sure about firestorm; I guess not if it's caused by bombing and war? EMsmile (talk) 09:28, 8 June 2022 (UTC)

Edit request: "Firestorm" section needs correction/expansion
The "Firestorm" section of this article reads "Firestorms are the rarest natural disaster. Fireballs fall from a storm cloud." This isn't correct; firestorms are weather systems that form during large wildfires/volcanic eruptions/other sources of intense heat and don't involve fireballs falling from clouds. This section should probably also link to the "Firestorm" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firestorm#Characterization_of_a_firestorm) and "Cumulonimbus flammagenitus" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumulonimbus_flammagenitus) pages. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Clairecedarlee (talk • contribs) 00:20, 10 December 2021 (UTC) Clairecedarlee (talk) 00:26, 10 December 2021 (UTC)


 * Yes, indeed it does. Total nonsense now corrected with place-holder text that any knowledgeable editor may wish to expand.  Velella  Velella Talk 16:52, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

Science
Fire Fire is a natural calamity or man made calamity? 2402:8100:3008:BC3A:1:1:495D:BD80 (talk) 15:18, 16 December 2021 (UTC)
 * Far too many assumptions here to be able to make a cogent response. Excess wild-fires linked to climate change are statistically most probably attributable to human causes, but a fire in a grate providing warmth and cooked food is not a calamity. What had you really meant to ask?  Velella  Velella Talk 16:55, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

How to integrate better with natural hazard?
I've reworked the article to make it clearer what the man-made component of natural disaster is and that the term "natural disaster" is misleading (as has been mentioned a few times on this talk page and also in the talk archive). I think it's better now although more could be done. Perhaps find better references that talk about the "misnomer" that "natural disaster" is. I also want to interlink it better with the article natural hazard. Currently there is a lot of overlap. At first I thought we should merge natural hazard to here. Now I am not really sure but I think perhaps it's better to cut down the listing of types of natural hazards at natural hazard to a pure bullet point list and to have the actual content about the disasters caused by those natural hazards here. There is also the sub-article geohazards which overlaps with natural hazard. EMsmile (talk) 09:37, 8 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Pinging User:NewsAndEventsGuy: the comments that you had made here helped me a lot with the terminology section. EMsmile (talk) 09:37, 8 June 2022 (UTC)
 * glad I could help NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 11:05, 8 June 2022 (UTC)