Not to minimize, which would be absurd, but to put into perspective.
About.com article from the USGS
A magnitude 7.8 earthquake at Mount Huascaran, Peru, on May 21, 1970, triggered a rock and snow avalanche that buried the towns of Yungay and
Ranrahirca, killing perhaps as many as 20,000 people[...]rain-caused landslides that hit Venezuela in mid-December of this year; official
estimates are as high as 30,000 deaths [...] a magnitude 9.5 event that struck Chile on May 22, 1960. More than 2,000 people were killed in
Chile, Hawaii, Japan, and the Philippines from this earthquake and the deadly tsunami that the earthquake created[...]a magnitude 8.0 that struck
Tianjin , China, on July 27, 1976. The official casualty figure issued by the Chinese government was 255,000, but unofficial estimates of the death
toll were as high as 655,000.[...] Mont Pelée in Martinique, Lesser Antilles, in 1902. The coastal town of St. Pierre, about 4 miles downslope to
the south, was demolished, and nearly 30,000 inhabitants were killed by an incandescent, high-velocity ash flow and associated hot gases and volcanic
dust.
The Wikipedia on Deadliest Natural Disasters
Tropical Cyclone 05B (1999), killed around 10,000 people in the Orissa state of India [...]Great Storm of 1703 (November 24 - December
2) 8,000 died.
Again, not trying to say that the destruction of the City of New Orleans is somehow lessened because of all of this. I do want to point out that
disasters happen, and its damned foolish of people to think that the don't or at least won't. I recall a lot of criticism of india and indonesia
for not having pacific tsunami monitors. It was idiotic of them not too. It was also simply insane for the US to not have better systems in place to
protect places like New Orleans. And inspite of this disaster the US still will not develop
adequate systems to protect, prevent, and deal
with the aftermath of massive flooding of the mississippi valley, atlantic tsunamis, plate earthquakes on the west coast, volcanic eruptions in the
yellowstone. People live in extremely dangerous places, and live there completely ignorantly and blindly of the incredible threat of death and
absolute destruction. This disaster isn't going to make any difference in policy or awareness, I suspect, and when the next, upcomming, disaster
occurs, there will be the same
havoc and
misery that we are seeing
right now. The pompeians were surprised when vesuvius
erupted, that was nearly 2,000 years ago and people still haven't adjusted properly. Heck its taught in
school books, and people read it and
shake their heads saying 'what did they expect'.
[edit on 2-9-2005 by Nygdan]
