1.

Haiyuan Flows, Ningxia, China, December 1920 (100,000+ deaths)

The 8.5-magnitude Haiyuan Earthquake was the world’s second deadliest earthquake of the 20th Century.
It generated a series of 675 major loess landslides causing massive destruction to lives and property. The
natural calamity which struck the rural district of Haiyuan on the evening of December 16, 1920 claimed
over 100,000 lives, and severely damaged an area of approximately 20,000 square kilometers. The worst
affected areas included the the epicenter of the earthquake in the Haiyuan County in what is now the Ningxia
Hui Autonomous Region, as well as the neighboring provinces of Gansu and Shaanxi. Haiyuan County
alone lost more than 50% of its population in the disaster. One of the landslides buried an entire village in
Xiji County as well.

2. Vargas Tragedy, Vargas, Venezuela, December 1999 (30,000 deaths)

The Winter of 1999 witnessed unusually heavy rainfall in the Vargas State of Venezuela. The rainfall
triggered a series of large and small flash floods and debris flows that claimed around 30,000 lives in the
region. As per estimates, approximately 10% of the population of Vargas perished in the disaster. The
entire towns of Carmen de Uria and Cerro Grande completely vanished under the mud bed, and a large
number of homes were simply swept away into the nearby ocean.

3. Armero Tragedy, Tolima, Colombia, November 1985 (23,000 deaths)

A dormant volcano, the Nevado del Ruiz in Tolima, Colombia, suddenly came to life on November 13,
1985, wreaking havoc on the nearby villages and towns, and killing as many as 23,000 people. A
pyroclastic flow from the crater of the volcano had melted the glaciers in the mountain and sent deadly
lahars, saturated with mud, ice, snow, and volcanic debris, rushing down the mountain at killer speeds
towards the residential areas directly below it. The lahars soon engulfed the town of Armero, killing
thousands there, while casualties were also reported in such other towns as Chinchiná

4. 70 Nevado Huascaran Debris Fall, Yungay, Peru, May 1970 (22,000 deaths)
In May of 1970, an earthquake triggered a massive series of landslides and avalanches of rock and snow
that buried the towns of Yungay and Ranrahirca. Nearly 22,000 people perished in this natural disaster.
The avalanche travelled a distance of 16.5 kilometers. It ended up carrying 50-100 million cubic meters of
water, mud, and rocks, which reached the village of Yungay and smothered all life forms therein under its
deadly cover.

5. North India Flood mudslides, Kedarnath, India, June 2013 (5,700 deaths)
One of the worst natural disasters in the history of India occurred in June of 2013, when powerful flash
floods killed around 5,700 people in the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand. Consistent cloudbursts and
incessant monsoon rainfall were primarily held responsible for the disaster, which has been officially
termed as a natural calamity. However, a section of environmentalists, scientists, and the educated public
think otherwise. According to them, thoughtless human intervention in the Himalayan mountain
ecosystem had rendered the ecosystem extremely fragile and prone to disaster. The unchecked tourism in
the region had promoted the rapid growth of hotels, roads, and shops throughout the region without
paying heed to the environmental laws and demands of the ecosystem. The mushrooming of hydroelectric
dams in Uttarakhand was also another important factor held responsible for the environmental damage.
Heavy rainfall had been previously recorded in the region which had also led to flash floods, but the
devastation produced in 2013 was comparable to no earlier data. It is believed that floodwaters had no
outlets this time, as most of the routes taken by the water previously were now blocked by sand and rocks.
Hence, the lethal waters, laden with debris from dam construction and large volumes of mud and rocks,
inundated towns and villages and buried all forms of life that came in its way.