The Mt. Vesuvius eruption in 79 AD destroyed the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum killing an estimated 16,000 people.

Quote:Mount Vesuvius spawned a deadly cloud of volcanic gas, stones, ash and fumes to a height of 33 km (20.5 miles), spewing molten rock and pulverized pumice at the rate of 1.5 million tons per second, ultimately releasing a hundred thousand times the thermal energy released by the Hiroshima bombing.

Victims that were killed instantly by hot gases and ash had a porous shell that formed around their bodies and it remained after the flesh underneath naturally decayed.

The Santorini eruption that wiped out the Minoan culture was far worse than Vesuvius. But because the ruins of Pompeii survived to show the amount of destruction it is always the first thought of people thinking about Volcanic eruptions in the Mediterranean. But the Santorini eruption is most likely the origin of the legend of Atlantis, described by Plato.



Campi Flegrei is another Mediterranean danger, since it's a super volcano, from which Vesuvius, Etna, and many other Italian volcanos are merely a small offshoots. It's also of considerable concern to geologists at present.

The 2004 Tsunami.

The Banqiao Reservoir Dam and Shimantan Reservoir Dam were the 2 major dams in China that failed during Typhoon Nina in 1975. In total, there were 62 dams that either failed or were intentionally destroyed due to the extreme amount of railfall from Nina. It is estimated that over 171,000 people were killed as a result of the dam failures. There were also approximately 11 million made homeless by the disaster, which also result in the loss of 18 gigawatts of energy produced by the dams. This is one of the worst man-made disasters in human history.

There's a potential tsunami threat on the east coast of the US is a volcanic island off the coast of Spain/Africa erupts and causes a landslide. Campi Flegrei is definitely a tremendous threat and just may be Earth's next supervolcanic eruption.

Manmade, I think the Johnstown flood of the late 1800's ranks up there.

(07-05-2014 01:19 PM)ClairtonPanther Wrote:  There's a potential tsunami threat on the east coast of the US is a volcanic island off the coast of Spain/Africa erupts and causes a landslide. Campi Flegrei is definitely a tremendous threat and just may be Earth's next supervolcanic eruption.

Manmade, I think the Johnstown flood of the late 1800's ranks up there.

I believe you're speaking of La Palma in the Canary Islands, which is off the coast of Africa. A chunk of rock the size of the Isle of Man is in danger of breaking off and falling into the sea, which would endanger over 100 million people around the Atlantic seaboard, primary in Africa and the American east coast. For many islands in the Caribbean there would be no safe place to be. The waves would roll over the islands, and few places would be high enough to escape the onrushing water.

Campi Flegrei would likely render most of Europe, as well as parts of Africa and Asia uninhabitable for some time. It would also cause devastation on a worldwide scale never before seen, resulting in the death of at least half of the world's population, many by starvation once the world's climate changed from all the ash and sulfur compounds in the air.

But the Johnstown flood was nowhere near the scale of the floods caused by the dam failures in China that resulted from 1975's Typhoon Nina. There were over 100 killed in China's disaster for every one killed in Johnstown.

The 2004 tsunami supposedly killed at least 250,000. Not sure any others killed that many, though of course it's an estimate. It might be a very conservative one though.

The Plague

The worst natural disaster was the Toba eruption. It took the human population from a few million to thirty thousand. It nearly wiped out our species and was the beginning of the end for the Neanderthal. Who knows what kind of human diversity would be around if Toba didn't blow it's top 70KYA.

(07-08-2014 08:07 AM)EverRespect Wrote:  The Plague

Plauges have had one positive impact. There are now people living in the world with an immune system so strong they don't catch diseases, including AIDS, hepatitis, and other deadly diseases. They are probably indestructible, as far as any disease is concerned.

Age is another matter. Time wears down all eventually.

(07-08-2014 10:07 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  

(07-08-2014 08:07 AM)EverRespect Wrote:  The Plague

Plauges have had one positive impact. There are now people living in the world with an immune system so strong they don't catch diseases, including AIDS, hepatitis, and other deadly diseases. They are probably indestructible, as far as any disease is concerned.

Age is another matter. Time wears down all eventually.

The black plague wiped out 30-50% of Europe's population and killed a lot more people than any war or volcano. Not to mention, it prolonged a Dark Age they were coming out of for another 200 years and led to paranoia, holocaust and inquisition. While it did lead to some advancement in medicine and some Darwinism by attrition, I would say the overall impact was quite the disaster.

For America, I'd have to go with the Great Storm of 1900 that hit Galveston. That thing pretty much leveled everything on the island. They still can't agree on how many people died. It was tragic.

(07-10-2014 02:21 PM)Side Show Joe Wrote:  For America, I'd have to go with the Great Storm of 1900 that hit Galveston. That thing pretty much leveled everything on the island. They still can't agree on how many people died. It was tragic.

A very good book on the subject is Isaac's Storm by Erik Larson.

(07-10-2014 07:45 AM)EverRespect Wrote:  

(07-08-2014 10:07 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  

(07-08-2014 08:07 AM)EverRespect Wrote:  The Plague

Plauges have had one positive impact. There are now people living in the world with an immune system so strong they don't catch diseases, including AIDS, hepatitis, and other deadly diseases. They are probably indestructible, as far as any disease is concerned.

Age is another matter. Time wears down all eventually.

The black plague wiped out 30-50% of Europe's population and killed a lot more people than any war or volcano. Not to mention, it prolonged a Dark Age they were coming out of for another 200 years and led to paranoia, holocaust and inquisition. While it did lead to some advancement in medicine and some Darwinism by attrition, I would say the overall impact was quite the disaster.

I can name far more negative aspects of the Plagues, of which the Black Plague is merely one. But that wasn't germane to what I was saying. You've totally missed my point, which isn't unusual. You were looking at the situation from a narrow viewpoint, which wasn't wide enough to comprehend what I'm trying to get across.

And what I was trying to get across was that out of all that misery there was a positive that came out of it. But you're so focused on the negative aspects you weren't able to see that.

(07-10-2014 07:45 AM)EverRespect Wrote:  

(07-08-2014 10:07 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  

(07-08-2014 08:07 AM)EverRespect Wrote:  The Plague

Plauges have had one positive impact. There are now people living in the world with an immune system so strong they don't catch diseases, including AIDS, hepatitis, and other deadly diseases. They are probably indestructible, as far as any disease is concerned.

Age is another matter. Time wears down all eventually.

The black plague wiped out 30-50% of Europe's population and killed a lot more people than any war or volcano. Not to mention, it prolonged a Dark Age they were coming out of for another 200 years and led to paranoia, holocaust and inquisition. While it did lead to some advancement in medicine and some Darwinism by attrition, I would say the overall impact was quite the disaster.

Maybe it killed more people than Toba but Toba killed a far larger percentage. The human population went from 3M to 30K.

I'm putting my chips on The Spanish Flu 1917-1919. Adjusting those percentages to the World population today is staggering.
As for Man Made. WW2. Lots of Russians didn't get a chance to grow old

Fukajima may end up having a massive effect on life on Earth as we know it, before all is said and done. The entire northern Pacific basin is becoming radioactive and the radiation leaking from the reactor shows no sign of slowing down.

Electing our latest POTUS.

Hurricane Katrina could have been much worse for America, although one could argue New Orleans will never make a full recovery. The worst part is that it was almost entirely preventable.