MOUNT CARMEL COLLEGE OF TEACHER

EDUCATION FOR WOMEM

EDU: 106.14
ENVIORNMENTAL EDUCATION

TOPIC: 3.5 (a)

NATURAL DISASTERS
 INTRODUCTION
 Disaster is a natural or man made event
that negatively affect life, property etc.

 They leads to permanent changes to human

societies, ecosystem and environments

 They may be sudden, powerful and

uncontrollable, cause destruction or disruption
 Epidemic

Land slide Earthquakes

Natural Flood
Tsunami
disasters

Cyclones Drought

Forest fire
 Natural disasters may occur in different ways

 Crisis effect: The awareness to the disaster is greatest during and

immediately following the occurrence

 Levee effect: Once measures are taken to prevent the next disaster,
people tend to settle in and around the preventive mechanisms

eg: building a levee next to the river bank.

 Adaptation: People who live in the area of greatest exposure, they
apparently come to accept the threat and become “learn to live with it”

 Personality variables: They may affect how people perceive hazards

such as internal or external locus of control i.e.; the place of control
where something happen and also the the nation or belief or repressor
i.e.; who repress negative information
EPIDEMICS
 EPIDEMICS
 The word epidemic coming from the Greek words epic (upon or above)
and domos (people)

 It is the rapid spread of infectious disease to a large no of people in a

given population with in a short period of time

 It generally caused by some factors including

A change in ecology of the host population
 A genetic change in pathogen reservoir or the introduction
of an emerging pathogen to a host population

 Generally an epidemic occurs when host immunity to either an

established pathogen or newly emerging pathogen

 It may be restricted to one location however, if it spread to other

countries or continents and affect a substantial number of people, it
may be termed a pandemic
 CAUSES OF EPIDEMICS
 There are several changes that may occur in an infectious agent that
may trigger an epidemic
Increased virulence
Introduction into a novel setting
Changes in host susceptibility to the infectious agent
 The outbreak of epidemics include infected food, migration of
population of certain animals (vectors)
 Certain epidemics occur at certain seasons
eg: whooping cough occurs in spring
F0REST FIRE
 FOREST FIRE
 A forest fire is an uncontrolled fire occurring in nature

 It is a natural disaster consisting of a fire which destroys a forested area

 It danger to people who live in forests as well as wild life

 Also known as wild fires, vegetation fire, grass fire etc.

 They are part of the ecological circle of Mediterranean ecosystem

 It affect on most ecosystems, flora and fauna

 Earth is an intrinsically flammable planet

owning to its cover of carbon rich vegetation
 Wild fires can be characterised in terms of the cause of ignition, their
physical property, the combustible material present and the effect of
weather the fire

 It can cause damage to property and human life but they have some
beneficial effects native vegetation, animals, and ecosystem that have
evolved with fire

 Many plant species depend on the effects of fire for growth and
reproduction
 Strategies of wildfire prevention, detection, and suppression have
varied over the years

 One common and inexpensive technique is controlled burning

permitting or even igniting smaller fires to minimize the amount of
flammable material available for a potential wild fire

 Vegetation may be burned periodically to maintain high species

diversity and frequent burning of surface fuels limits fuel accumulation
 CAUSES OF FOREST FIRE
 Dry climate
 Lightening
 Volcanic eruption

 Most common direct human causes are arson, discarded cigarettes

power line arcs and spark from equipment's

The spread of wild fire varies based on the flammable material present,
weather condition etc.
 FLOOD
 It is a state of high water level along a river channel or on the cost

 Flood may happen gradually and also may take hours or even happen
suddenly without any warning

 There are different types of floods namely: flash flood, riverine flood,
urban flood etc.

 Wireless network and telephone connections are used to monitor flood

condition
 CAUSES OF FLOOD

 Heavy rainfall
 Heavy siltation of the river bed reduces the water carrying capacity of
the river
 Blockage in the drains lead to flooding of the area
 Landslides blocking the flow of the stream
 Construction of dam and reservoirs
 In areas prone to cyclone, strong winds accompanied by heavy down
pour along with storm surge leads to flooding
 Flood: Typical Adverse Effects
 The most important consequence of floods is the loss of life and
property

 Houses, bridges, roads etc. are get damaged by the gushing water

 There is huge loss to life and livestock caused by drowning

 Lack of drinking water, contamination of water leads to outbreak of

epidemics
 It also leads to a large area of agricultural land getting inundated as a
result there is a huge crop loss

 The shortage of crop result in shortage of food and animal fodder

 Flood also affect the soil characteristics

 The land may be rendered due to erosion of top layer or may turn
saline if sea water floods the area
 Flood: Warning
 Flood forecasting and warning has been highly developed in the past
two decades

 With the advancement of technology flood waves can be tracked as the

water level rises

 High tides with high winds may indicate flooding in the costal area

 Warning is issued by the Central Water Commission(CWC), Irrigation

and Flood Control Department and Water Resources Department
 Flood: Possible Risk Reduction Measures
 Mapping of the flood prone areas

 Land use control

 Construction of engineered structures

 Flood control

 Flood management
 EARTHQUAKE
 It is the most destructive natural hazard

 It is the sudden shaking of the earth crust

 The impact of an earthquake is sudden and there is hardly any warning,

making it impossible to predict

 The unpredictability and suddenness earthquakes have caused greater

damage than other natural hazards
 Earthquake can be described by the use of two distinctively different
scales of measurement demonstrating magnitude and intensity

 Earthquake magnitude or amount of energy released is determined by

the use of ‘seismograph’ it continuously record the ground vibration

 Intensity scale measures the effect of an earthquake where occurs

 CAUSES OF EARTHQUAKE

 The earth crust is a rocky layer, the crust is not one piece but consist of
portions called ‘plates’ which varying in size

 When these plates contact each other stress arise the crust
 GENARAL CHARACTERISTICS OF EARTHQUAKE

 The vibrations are occur in different frequencies and velocities

 The actual rupture process may last for a few seconds to as long as one
minute for a major earthquake

 The ground shaking is caused by body waves and surface wave

 Based on focal depth
Deep: 300 to 700 kms from the earth surface
Medium: 60 to 300 kms
Shallow : less than 60 kms

 Deep focal earthquake are rarely destructive, shallow focal earthquake

are more common and are extremely damaging
 DROUGHT

 It is the absence or deficiency of rainfall from its normal pattern in a

region for an extended period of time
 Drought can occur by improper distribution of rain in time and space,
and not just its amount

 It is a negative balance between precipitation and water use in a

geographical area
 The effect of drought accumulated slowly over a considerable period of
time
 CAUSES OF DROUGHT
 Basically caused by deficient rainfall

 Overpopulation

 Over grazing

 Deforestation

 Soil erosion
 TYPES OF DROUGHT

 Meteorological drought

 Hydrological drought

 Agricultural drought

 Socio-economic drought
 POSSIBLE RISK REDUCTION MEASURES

o Public awareness and education

o Drought monitoring
o Water supply augmentation and conservation
o Expansion of irrigation
o Livelihood planning
o Drought planning
 CYCLONES
 Cycloneis a region of low atmospheric pressure surrounded by high
atmospheric pressure

 Itresulting in swirling atmospheric disturbance accompanied by

powerful winds blowing anticlockwise direction in the Northern
Hemisphere and the clockwise direction in the Southern Hemisphere

 They occur mainly in the tropical and temperate regions of the world
 Cyclones are generally accompanied by strong winds which
cause a lot of destruction

 Insome cases it is accompanied by heavy downpour and also

the rise in the sea which intrudes inland there by causing floods
 The development of a cyclone covers three stages they are

(a) Formation and initial development state

(b) Fully matured

(c) Weakening or decay

POSSIBLE RISK REDUCTION MEASURES

 Costalbelt plantation
 Hazard mapping
 Land use control
 Engineered structures
 Flood management
 Improving vegetation cover
 LAND SLIDES
 The term landslide includes a wide range of ground movement , such
as rock falls, deep failure of slopes, and shallow debris flows

 It refers to the potential of occurrence of a damaging landslide within

in a given area

 Such damage could include loss of life or injury, property damage,

social, economic and environmental conditions
 They often take place in conjunction with earthquakes, floods
and volcanos

 Prolonged rainfall causing landslide may block the flow of

river for quite some time
 CAUSES OF LANDSLIDE

 Geological weak material

 Erosion
 Intenserainfall
 Human excavation
 Earthquake shaking
 Volcanic eruption
 TYPES OF LANDSLIDES

 Falls  Lahar

 Flows  Mudflow

 Creep  Lateral spreads

 Debris flow  Slides

 Debris avalanche  Topple

 TSUNAMI
 The term tsunami has been derived from two Japanese term ‘Tsu’
(harbour) and ‘nami’ (waves)

 They are popularly called tidal wave

 It is a very swiftly travelling sea wave, that attains great height

 The huge wave hit on the shores of many countries especially, India,
Srilanka, Indonesia etc. and washed off the shores with the whole
biotic and abiotic community its self‘s

 On26th December of the year 2004, world population witnessed the

drastic and pathetic effects of Tsunami

 The earthquake is formed under the depths Indian ocean may be one of
the known route causes for this natural calamity

 Theexact place of origin was estimated as Java and Sumatra Islands of

Indonesia
 TSUNAMI: GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS
 Tsunami differ from ordinary ocean waves

 The waves are travel much faster than ordinary waves

 A tsunami to consist of ten or more waves which is then termed as

‘tsunami wave train’

 Itnormally causes flooding as a huge wall of water enters in the main

land
 Tsunami: Predictability

 There are two distinct types of warning

a. International tsunami warning system

a. Regional warning system

 CONCLUSION

 Disaster reflect people’s vulnerability or their susceptibility to be

affected when confronted with floods, cyclones, landslides or other
potentially harmful natural phenomena

 Who suffer from disaster are not helpless victims

THANK YOU