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are oft en destroyed within a short period of
time, leaving families homeless and shutting
down the aff ected businesses permanently.
Cyclones destroy structures at a whim,
earthquakes can cause structural damage that
might not be apparent at fi rst glance, and
tsunamis and fl oods sweep homes off their
foundations.
Rebuilding and rescuing requires huge capital.
Environment
Humans aren’t the only living things
aff ected by natural disasters. Animals can be
displaced from their homes and sometimes
they have no alternative but to leave the
area and try to adapt to a new habitat.
Volcanoes, earthquakes, fl oods, wildfi res
and mudslides oft en permanently reshape an
area’s landscape, in some cases, leading to the
Floods caused by Hurricane Harvey in 2017 extinction of a local species.
Emotional Toll
Man-made Disasters
Th e emotional toll caused by natural disasters
is very devastating. Whole communities A man-made disaster is a disaster caused by
may be displaced, separating friends and human action. Some examples of man-made
neighbours. Victims face anxiety and disasters include hazardous material spills,
depression as they constantly fear it happening explosions, chemical or biological attacks,
again. In extreme cases, they may experience nuclear blasts and traffi c collisions such as
post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). train accidents, plane crashes, and so on.
Most of these disasters are in the form of
Economic Concerns
accidents (except attacks) and cause death,
Natural disasters infl ict grave damage not injuries, and loss of property. Th ey are also
only on humans and property but also on the known as anthropogenic disasters.
economy. Over the last 40 years, economic
losses from natural disasters have increased Types of Man-made Disasters
ninefold. For example, Hurricane Katrina
Nuclear Disasters
grabbed headlines as the most expensive
tropical cyclone in history by both economic A nuclear disaster is the emission of large
and insured losses, but the season as a whole amounts of radioactive substances from
caused aggregate economic losses of US$209 nuclear power plants. If we breathe in these
billion. radioactive substances or get exposed to
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