Online Course for Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) Exam
(Assistant Commandant)
Environment & Ecology
Disasters & Their Management
Processes like fire, floods, landslides, earthquakes,
volcanic activity, cyclone, tornado, drought etc. continue to cause loss of life
and damage to property. The magnitude and frequency of these processes depend on
such factors as climate, geology, vegetation and human activity. An important
aspect of all natural hazards and processes is the potential to produce a
catastrophe. Catastrophe is defined as any situation in which the damages to
people, property or society in general are sufficient and that recovery and/or
rehabilitation is a long involved process. Processes with a low catastrophic
potential include coastal erosion, frost, lightening and expansive soils (White
and Haas, 1975).
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Natural disasters between 1900 and 1976
|
Disaster |
Persons killed |
Persons injured or left homeless |
| Earthquakes | 2,662,765 | 28,894,457 |
| Volcanic eruptions | 128,058 | 337,931 |
| Floods | 1,287,645 | 175,220,220 |
| Landslides | 3,006 | 44,673 |
| Avalanches | 3,059 | 150 |
| Cyclones | 434,894 | 17,648,463 |
| Hurricanes | 18,513 | 1,197,535 |
| Typhoons | 34,103 | 5,437,054 |
| Storms | 7,110 | 3,432,641 |
| Tornadoes | 1,175 | 342,459 |
| Total | 4,579,728 | 232,555,783 |
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All the same a rough estimate of the damage and the
comparative losses on account of these, have been attempted by the United
Nations some years back. -
Out of a total of some 4.5 million deaths, due to all these
disasters, over 2.6 million deaths were caused by earthquakes alone during the
period of some 75 years. This should give some idea of the relative danger from
the natural disasters. Floods are the next claimant for deaths of some 1.2
million people. -
These figures may change from year to year but, by and large,
the proportion of deaths will remain more or less similar. The third in the
matter of causing deaths is the cyclone which caused over 400,000 deaths.
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