January 13, 2020

Earth has been a particularly dangerous place in recent weeks. Airplane crashes, military clashes, terror attacks, and political unrest have taken a toll on human life and happiness lately, but it is a series of natural disasters that has caused the most trouble. A typhoon ravaged the Philippines, deadly flash floods hit Indonesia, bushfires continued to rage in Australia, a measles epidemic continued to kill in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and a series of earthquakes rattled Puerto Rico.

Firefighters confront a bushfire near the Blue Mountains town of Bilpin, New South Wales, on Dec. 19, 2019. Credit: © 1234rf/Shutterstock

On Christmas Eve and Christmas Day Typhoon Phanfone (also called Ursula) struck the Philippines, producing high winds and flooding that killed 105 people in the Visayan Island provinces of Biliran, Capiz, Iloilo, and Leyte. Phanfone was a Category 2 storm (moderate strength) with sustained winds of more than 90 miles (150 kilometers) per hour. Storm surges and deadly flash floods hit communities just as families were gathering to celebrate the Christmas holiday. Thousands of homes were damaged or destroyed.

On New Year’s Day in Indonesia, abnormally heavy monsoon rains caused flash floods that killed 66 people and displaced hundreds of thousands of others in Jakarta, the capital. Some 14.5 inches (37 centimeters) of rain fell on New Year’s Eve, causing the Ciliwung and Cisadane rivers to overflow. Floodwaters submerged more than 150 neighborhoods and caused landslides in the Bogor and Depok districts on the outskirts of Jakarta. Flood water levels in some areas peaked at more than 13 feet (4 meters). Electric power was cut off, and closed schools and government buildings were converted into emergency shelters.

On January 7, the World Health Organization announced the 6,000th death from measles in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) since an epidemic began there in 2019. More than 300,000 suspected measles cases have been reported in the DRC—a nation also troubled by recent terror attacks. The epidemic has continued and grown because of low vaccination coverage, malnutrition, weak public health systems, outbreaks of other epidemic-prone diseases (such as Ebola), and the difficulty of getting health care to people in remote areas.

In Puerto Rico, after several smaller earthquakes, a 6.4-magnitude temblor struck the southwestern part of the island on January 7. The earthquake, the strongest to hit Puerto Rico in more than 100 years, killed one person, toppled hundreds of structures, and forced a state of emergency. Many people lost their homes, the island briefly lost electric power, and schools and public offices were closed. In the 10 days before the 6.4-magnitude earthquake, the United States Geological Survey recorded hundreds of temblors in Puerto Rico—including 10 of 4-magnitude or greater.

A number of major bushfires have lately devastated southeastern Australia. Since September, the wild fires—mostly in New South Wales, Queensland, and Victoria—have burned more than 25.5 million acres (10.3 million hectares), an area the size of South Korea. The bushfires have destroyed more than 2,100 homes and killed 27 people and hundreds of millions of animals. On January 8, the Australian government ordered the mass slaughter of thousands of wild camels and horses that have invaded rural towns looking for water. Many people are without electric power and telecommunications in Australia’s southeast, and some were without drinking water and other supplies. Smoke has obscured the city skies of Canberra, Melbourne, and Sydney. The bushfires followed a three-year drought that experts link to climate change.

October 1, 2018

Two weeks ago, early on the morning of Sept. 15, 2018 (September 14 in the United States), Typhoon Mangkhut struck the main Philippine island of Luzon. In a country accustomed to seasonal tempests, the Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) gives its own names to storms: there, Mangkhut (the named bestowed on the storm by the World Meteorological Organization) was known as Ompong. The typhoon raged regardless of name, causing deadly flooding and landslides that killed 95 people in Luzon. Mangkhut then killed one person on Taiwan and six others in China. On September 20, days after the storm dissipated, waterlogged soil on the central Philippine island of Cebu caused a landslide that killed another 85 people.

Members of the Filipino Bureau of Fire Protection carry a victim of a landslide in Luzon’s Benguet province on Sept. 18, 2018. Credit: © Basilio Sepe, Getty Images

Typhoon Mangkhut formed as a tropical depression over the Marshall Islands in the North Pacific Ocean on September 7. The storm grew into a tropical storm near Bikini Atoll and escalated to a Category 5 (the strongest level) typhoon in the Northern Marianas. Mangkhut roared westward across the Pacific and on September 12 the storm entered the Philippine Area of Responsibility (PAR), the zone in the northwestern Pacific where PAGASA tracks dangerous weather.

Typhoon Mangkhut (Ompong) hit the northern Philippines and then crossed the South China Sea to Hong Kong and China’s Guangdong Province. Credit: WORLD BOOK map

In preparation for the massive storm, schools and public offices were closed in northern Luzon and people were evacuated from many coastal areas. Across the South China Sea in Hong Kong, officials issued a rare “No. 10” typhoon warning signal, the highest level of storm threat, and briefly shut down public services. Parts of China’s Guangdong Province also issued red alerts and closed schools and public offices.

Mangkhut reached the shores of Cagayán Valley, Luzon’s most northern administrative region, on September 15. The storm lashed Cagayán and the nearby Cordillera and Ilocos regions, where winds as fierce as 125 miles (205 kilometers) per hour ripped up trees and houses and torrential rains caused flash flooding and mudslides. Mangkhut then leapt to China, where deadly winds knocked down thousands of trees and shattered windows in swaying high-rise buildings. Floodwaters blocked roads and railways and inundated coastal communities. On nearby Taiwan, the lone death occurred when strong ocean currents related to the storm swept a beachgoer out to sea.

July 24, 2018

From the end of June through early July 2018, torrential rains intensified by Typhoon Prapiroon caused catastrophic flooding in southwestern Japan. The floods breached levees and washed out towns and roads in heavily populated areas, killing 225 people and leaving several others missing. The freshwater floods (as opposed to tsunamis and ocean-generated flooding) were the deadliest in Japan since flooding killed 299 people in Nagasaki in 1982.

Floodwaters swamp houses in the Okayama city of Kurashiki on July 8, 2018. Credit: © STR/AFP/Getty Images

Unusually heavy seasonal rains began on the island of Kyushu and nearby areas on June 28. With flooding already beginning in some prefectures, Typhoon Prapiroon dumped immense amounts of rain beginning on July 3. As the situation worsened, the Japan Meteorological Agency issued emergency alerts, prompting the evacuation of several million people. Areas of Kyushu became awash in flooding, as did parts of nearby Honshu and Shikoku islands. In Honshu, Japan’s largest and most populous island, floodwaters as high as 16 feet (5 meters) devastated the southwestern prefectures of Hiroshima and Okayama. The worst short deluge took place in Kōchi prefecture on Shikoku, where 10.4 inches (26.3 centimeters) of rain fell in just 3 hours. On July 6 and 7, the Kōchi city of Motoyama recorded 23 inches (58.4 centimeters) of rain in as many hours. The deluge continued until July 9, when the rain gave way to stifling heat that has since claimed another 70 lives.

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In late June and early July 2018, flooding killed 225 people in southwestern Japan. Credit: WORLD BOOK map

Flooding and mudslides caused the most casualties in Hiroshima, where 113 people died and hundreds more were injured. At least 60 people died in Okayama where the Odagawa and Takahashi rivers burst their banks, and 26 people were killed in Ehime prefecture on Shikoku. Deaths also occurred in Fukuoka, Kōchi, Kyoto, Yamaguchi, and other prefectures. Most of the victims had ignored evacuation and other precautionary orders; several died trying to escape the floods when their vehicles were swept away. The hardest hit areas lacked appropriate levees and other flood emergency infrastructure.

More than 50,000 military and emergency personnel and thousands of volunteers responded to help people trapped by the flooding. Many roads and railways were submerged by floodwaters or blocked by debris, but boat and helicopter rescue missions ran nonstop until the floodwaters subsided and roads once again became passable. Thousands of people were rescued from the rooftops of their flooded homes.

The floods also severely damaged area crops, livestock, and wildlife. People out of immediate danger were troubled by electric power outages, commuter train stoppages, and the closure of many public and private businesses.

December 5, 2012

An extremely powerful typhoon has left at least 620 people dead and some 800 more missing on the Philippine island of Mindanao. Typhoon Bopha smashed into southern Mindanao yesterday with torrential rains and winds of up to 100 miles (160 kilometers) per hour that flattened entire villages, leaving thousands homeless. The storm also decimated the region’s economic base, banana plantations. The Philippines is annually hit by as many as 20 powerful tropical storms, but Bopha blew south of the usual typhoon path.

The large Philippine island of Mindanao lies at the southeastern end of the country. World Book map; map data © MapQuest.com, Inc.

Additional World Book articles:

• Philippines 2011 (a Back in Time article)
• How the Ocean Affects Climate (a special report)
• What We Know About Global Warming (a special report)