Data captured between 1900 and 2019 by the Institute for Economics and Peace reveal an increase from 39 incidents in 1960 to 396 in 2019. The world has witnessed a tenfold increase in the number of natural disasters since the 1960s, the 2020 Ecological Threat Register (ETR) shows. Data captured between 1900 and 2019 by the Institute for Economics and Peace reveal an increase from 39 incidents in 1960 to 396 in 2019. In 2005, the world experienced the largest amount of natural disasters that left a death toll of more than 90,000 after 442 incidents with another 160 million people in need of immediate assistance. The negative impacts of natural disasters depend on the intensity of individual incidents. Natural disasters can be of low intensity and occurring frequently, or they can be one-off catastrophic events. In 2004, a tsunami affected numerous countries in Southeast Asia and represents a one-off catastrophic incident that has substantial impacts. The tsunami caused more than 220,000 deaths and widespread destruction across the region. The resulting cost of addressing damage caused by natural disasters has risen from US$50 billion per year in the 1980s to US$ 200 billion per year in the last decade.

Flooding is the most common natural disaster since 1990. From 1990 to 2019, a total of 9,924 natural disasters occurred globally, of which 42 per cent were floods. Storms including cyclones, hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, and dust storms, followed and accounted for 30% of the total natural disasters in this time period. Together, floods and storms account for 71% of the disasters that have occurred since 1990. Changes in climate conditions, especially the warming of global temperatures increases the likelihood of weather-related natural disasters. Hotter global temperatures increase the risk of droughts as well as increase the intensity of storms and create wetter monsoons. This is most visible when seen through changes in the intensity and frequency of droughts, storms, floods, extreme temperatures and wildfires. In the face of more common extreme weather events and climate related disasters, natural resources such as land and water will be most vulnerable.       https://www.visionofhumanity.org/global-number-of-natural-disasters-increases-ten-times/                                         .......AND....... Drought- Alberta’s Brutal Water Reckoning- Scientists who studied the region’s arid past warned this drought was coming. Thirst for growth won out. A Tyee special report.  Andrew Nikiforuk 19 Feb 2024The TyeeTyee contributing editor Andrew Nikiforuk is an award-winning journalist whose books and articles focus on epidemics, the energy industry, nature and more. Alberta’s water reckoning has begun in earnest. Snowpack accumulations in the Oldman River basin, the Bow River basin and the North Saskatchewan River basin range from 33 to 62 per cent below normal. A reduced snowpack means less summer water for the fish and all water drinkers. Ancient glaciers that feed and top up prairie rivers in the late summer melted at record speeds last year, the hottest on global records. Many indomitable ice packs, such as the well-studied Peyto Glacier, are disappearing altogether, wasted by the desiccating hand of climate disorder. Fifty-one river basins from Milk River to Hay River report critical water shortages due to low rainfall and high temperatures, according tothe provincial government. With less water in the rivers and ground, the cottonwoods and willows that decorate the banks of prairie rivers are dying. Parched rural communities have even begun to question the huge thirst of the powerful oil and gas industry. A water commission that provides potable water to the municipalities of Innisfail, Bowden, Olds, Didsbury, Carstairs and Crossfield has banned treated bulk water supplies to the fracking industry, which permanently removes water from the water cycle. One study recently noted that water consumption by frackers “intensifies local water competition and alters water supply threatened by climate variability.” Yet the Alberta government has not declared an emergency. It says it is planning for extreme drought but hoping for snow and rain.Meanwhile Danielle Smith’s United Conservative Party government has appointed an advisory body with no known water experts. But it does include Ian Anderson, a promoter of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion that will transport bitumen from the oilsands to the Port of Vancouver, criss-crossing many dwindling rivers, creeks and streams as it does.                 https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2024/02/19/Alberta-Brutal-Water-Reckoning/