People worry that disasters have become more frequent and more damaging since the close of the 20th century. But the 19th century’s natural disasters were plenty devastating; but there weren’t nearly as many of us around to suffer the consequences (nor as much media to record it). An 1811 earthquake centered in Missouri made the Mississippi run backwards and rang church bells in Boston; in 1815, a massive volcanic eruption in Indonesia brought starvation to Europe (global dimming) and snow to New England in June; in 1821, a bulls-eye strike by a hurricane nearly sank Manhattan; and a magnitude 5.5 earthquake rattled Gotham in 1884. Randall Parker wonders if the perils of the 19th century foretell even graver dangers today. [%comments]
Was the 20th Century Unusually Calm?
TAGS: natural disasters
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So which is the statistical anomaly, the disastrous 19th century or the relatively “calm” 20th? If the 19th century is an “outlier”, it would make sense that the 20th would be calmer, likewise, if the 20th is the outlier, the 19th may be the norm. Not enough data and I strongly suspect the same phenomenon as cancer clusters – they disappear when the map lines are redrawn. If we measured different periods, the distribution of disasters could look vastly different.
If you happen to be a primate, a cetacean, or any any of tens of thousands of named and unnamed plants and animals, the 20th century was an unmitigated disaster that continues today.
I’ve been trying to calm my grandmother down by telling her that the world isn’t crazier today than it was when she was growing up, it’s just that thanks to world-wide media and the internet, she just hears about more of the crazier things. That’s true both for natural and human disasters.
If these things happened today, people would freak out and there would be (even more) calls to stop all burning any fossil fuels. In reality, it would just be the crazy things nature does.
Of course, if nobody was around to record it, maybe it didn’t happen…. There have been disasters SO BIG that almost nobody survived to tell the tale. Tambora and Krakatoa, were such, and one might include some battles and human-caused disasters, too..
Notes: Hurricane in Galveston – Sept. 8, 1900 was 19th century, but it was only a “natural disaster” because people built a city where it was unsafe. The San Francisco Earthquake was a natural disaster, the fire that followed and destroyed most of the city was not. The Great Tejon (Estimate 7.9) Earthquake of 1852 disassembled log cabins. Very few people were killed–because there were very few people.
The Johnstown flood was man-made. A poorly made dam burst. Katrina, too was mad-made mess. New Orleans is below sea-level and protected by a 1500 miles of dikes. Yikes.
The USGS website is informative: http://www.usgs.gov/hazards/
In reviewing the data….I just don’t think the 20th century was special. It looks like random mayhem to me.
Just a note, not all cancer clusters “disappear”. I refer to Tom’s River, NJ, etc. I suspect there is probably a big Thyroid cancer cluster happening right now in New England thanks to Chernobyl. The Russian govt kindly issued immigration papers to survivors who all seemed to land in CT and MA.
Cancer Researchers still use clusters to track down causes.
I think the media hype is why the world seems so much worse these days.
On the natural disaster front, lack of people to report them does seem to be a factor. A program (Nova?) the other night on TV pointed out that Tsunamis have been hitting the Pacific NW for the last several hundred years with a lull during the 20th century. I think I’ll stick to the Midwest….
A few years back, I subscribed to an email list of worldwide earthquakes. The only qualifier was that they had to be bigger than a certain set limit; I think I picked Magnitude 5.0. I had it connected to my cellphone, so every time there was an earthquake over 5.0, I received a text message.
I eventually came to realize that Papua New Guinea has *way* more earthquakes than the rest of the world. But since, for the most part, they have neither large infrastructure to be damaged, nor large media to make a big deal out of this, their shakiness mostly goes unnoticed by the rest of the world.
Global warming is to blame.
Recent earthquakes in Fiji have been troubling, in that they have been big enough to kick off Tsunamis felt in Hawaii and California, although not to a destructive degree. They have, however done some major damage to some smaller inhabited islands, killing many.
Although the Missouri Quake is the largest in recorded US history, there have been many others of historical consequence. http://recentearthquakes.net has a good section on Famous Quakes and a record of their devastation. There is a 100% chance of a quake today. Whether there are more happening in the 20th Century, or less, they are happening somewhere every day. Be prepared. Bobby Vassallo