How common are natural disasters

A natural disaster can be considered as an event created by nature that causes wild-scale destruction of property or landscape, or loss of life. In 2022, there were 387 natural disasters and hazards recorded worldwide by EM-DAT (Emergency Event Database) which caused a combined total of 30,704 deaths and over 185 million people displaced or otherwise affected. Where you are in the world accounts for a lot when it comes to how likely you are to be caught in a natural disaster, but some interesting information on the most common is listed below.

A quick note on natural disaster death tolls:

The total amount of people who die from natural disasters compared to the global amount of unnatural deaths, which is anything other than old age or illness, is very small. Over the last decade, it has averaged between 0.01% and 0.4% of all global deaths. This is due to unpredictable freak weather events that are not a regular occurrence, so it is inaccurate to give an average yearly figure as there is a 40x increase between the two figures.

Floods

Floods are by far the most common type of natural disaster, but most of the death count is localized to specific areas. In 2022, a huge series of monsoon floods hit Pakistan and caused 1,739 confirmed deaths and over 15 billion USD in damage. Surrounding countries were also affected, with India losing over 2,000 people and China and Bangladesh having millions of people displaced. There are 10’s of thousands of floods around the world every year, but most of these are controlled and aren’t very damaging.

Droughts

Africa was affected the worst by last year’s droughts, which caused almost 2,500 deaths in Uganda alone. The USA suffered a financial loss of more than 22 billion USD, and several other countries lost billions from destroyed crops and damage to roads and buildings. Droughts normally happen every year in all countries that aren’t tropical or arctic but are often on a small scale and rarely kill anyone. African equator countries are always the most heavily affected and the worst equipped to deal with them, leading to the largest loss of life from droughts.

Earthquakes

There are an average of 55 earthquakes every single day, which is about 20,000 per year. The vast majority of these are so small people don’t even know they are happening, but the worst ones occur on fault lines and are many times more powerful than the average earthquake. Fault lines are where tectonic plates meet each other and create the highest levels of underground movement, as well as being home to a series of volcanoes. The worst earthquake event of last year happened in southeastern Afghanistan and claimed over 1,000 lives.

Volcanoes

There are an estimated 1,000 deaths globally each year from volcanic activity, but most of these were caused by the gases and ash that are released during an eruption, or from mudslides as opposed to being caught in lava. The worst volcanic eruptions ever recorded were Mount Vesuvius in 79AD, which caused over 20,000 deaths and buried several towns and villages, and the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa which claimed 36,000 lives.

Tornados

An estimated 75% of all tornados in the world start in or close to the US, which numbers about 1000. Canada has around 100 each year and the rest of the world usually doesn’t have more than 200 combined. The US averages between 60 and 80 deaths per year from tornadoes, but they have been more dangerous in the past, such as the tornado season of 1925 which killed 794 people.

Hurricanes

These can be thousands of times larger than a tornado and always form over water in certain conditions. They are more common in tropical regions and haven’t caused more than 10 deaths in the US in a single year over the last decade, but freak hurricanes have claimed thousands of lives. The worst hurricane in history was the “Great Hurricane” of 1780 in the Lesser Antilles which killed over 20,000 people.

Mudslides/landslides

These are caused by either ground tremours or more commonly by heavy rainfall loosening enough ground to cause a snow-ball effect of falling earth. The US suffers 25 to 50 deaths per year from landslides, but the real danger is in tropical countries where the death toll often reaches the thousands. In 1999, the Vargas Tragedy in Venezuela claimed approximately 30,000 lives over the course of two days, after millions of tons of soil, rock, and debris flowed into the town and trapped people in their homes until they were swept away.