A natural disaster is the consequence of a natural hazard (e.g. volcanic eruption, earthquake, tsunami or hurricanes) which affects human activities. Human vulnerability, exacerbated by the lack of planning or appropriate emergency management, leads to financial, environmental or human losses. The resulting loss depends on the capacity of the population to support or resist the disaster, and their resilience. This understanding is concentrated in the formulation: "disasters occur when hazards meet vulnerability". A natural hazard will hence never result in a natural disaster in areas without vulnerability, e.g. strong earthquakes in uninhabited areas. The term natural has consequently been disputed because the events simply are not hazards or disasters without human involvement.
Natural Disasters are naturally occurring events which can directly or indirectly cause severe threats to public health and/or well-being. Because they are naturally occurring natural disasters pose an ever present threat which can only be dealt with through proper planning and preparedness. Information on the major sources of natural disasters have been provided here to help educate the public on their cause and effects as they relate to emergency planning.
Avalanches
While avalanches are sudden, the warning signs are almost always numerous before they let loose. Yet in 90 percent of avalanche incidents, the snow slides are triggered by the victim or someone in the victim's party. Avalanches kill more than 150 people worldwide each year. Most are snowmobilers, skiers, and snowboarders.
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Earthquakes
Earthquakes, also called temblors, can be so tremendously destructive, it’s hard to imagine they occur by the thousands every day around the world, usually in the form of small tremors.
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Floods
There are few places on Earth where people need not be concerned about flooding. Any place where rain falls is vulnerable, although rain is not the only impetus for flood.
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Hurricanes
Hurricanes are giant, spiraling tropical storms that can pack wind speeds of over 160 miles (257 kilometers) an hour and unleash more than 2.4 trillion gallons (9 trillion liters) of rain a day. These same tropical storms are known as cyclones in the northern Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal, and as typhoons in the western Pacific Ocean.
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Lightning
Contrary to the common expression, lightning can and often does strike the same place twice, especially tall buildings or exposed mountaintops. Cloud-to-ground lightning bolts are a common phenomenon—about 100 strike Earth’s surface every single second—yet their power is extraordinary. Each bolt can contain up to one billion volts of electricity.
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Tornadoes
Tornadoes are vertical funnels of rapidly spinning air. Their winds may top 250 miles (400 kilometers) an hour and can clear-cut a pathway a mile (1.6 kilometers) wide and 50 miles (80 kilometers) long.
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Tsunami
The most infamous tsunami of modern times hit Indian Ocean shorelines on the day after Christmas 2004. That tsunami is believed to have packed the energy of 23,000 Hiroshima-type atomic bombs. Some 150,000 people were killed in a single day.
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Volcanoes
Volcanoes are awesome manifestations of the fiery power contained deep within the Earth. These formations are essentially vents on the Earth's surface where molten rock, debris, and gases from the planet's interior are emitted.
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Wildfires
Uncontrolled blazes fueled by weather, wind, and dry underbrush, wildfires can burn acres of land—and consume everything in their paths—in mere minutes.
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