Disaster 101.

When I was a kid, I thought typhoon and its accompanying flood was fun - a time out from school, staying at home, wading in the cool flood water, eating canned food (sardines and pork and beans), and tuning in to transistorized radio for twenty hours while mother monitored the weather condition.

The cleaning part was fun too; as soon as the water started to ebb, our family and neighbours, like a unified symphony, took out brush and broom and pails and scrubbed the gooey mud left behind by the flood.

Teens roamed the flooded streets looking out for their teen crushes, and bakeries ran out of bread and convenience stores were drained out of their supply especially candles.

It was almost a yearly ritual in our place in Mandaluyong which was few meters away from the Pasig River.

Flooded street in Manila

Then the experts said climate change took place. So now in the Philippines, in most of Asia, Americas, Africa, Europe and Australia, flooding has become rampant and deadly.

Few days ago, Central Europe experienced massive flooding.  Swollen rivers in the German states of Saxony-Anhalt and Schleswig-Holstein posed the biggest threat after flood waters caused billions of euros in damage and left at least 19 people dead across Europe.

In the United States, the major weather disturbance is the tornado. From January through June 12, 2013 alone, a total of 407 tornadoes has been recorded by the National Weather Service, according to wikipedia.

A killer tornado hit the town of Moore in Oklahoma on May 20, 2013 which caused a school building to collapse and claimed the lives of 7 school children.

Ghastly scene from the killer tornado which hit the Plaza Elementary School in Moore, Oklahoma, May 2013

Earthquake is often another deadly calamity which occurs in almost any part of the world.

The most recent one took place in Poland on June 14, 2013; it has a magnitude of 2.4. There was an earthquake in Tonga last June 13, 2013 with a magnitude of 5.0. Also on June 13, 2013, a strong earthquake jolted the island of Southern Java in Indonesia with a magnitude of 6.7. Also on this day, another earthquake with a magnitude of 5.7 hit the Ryukyu Islands in Japan. 

Chile, a South American country prone to earthquake experienced a recent one last June 11; it has a magnitude of 4. 2 and occurred in Antofagasta, Chile.

In the Philippine Islands, the last earthquake took place in the province of Mindoro which has a magnitude of 4.6.

Tsunami is another global weather threat. Because of seismic and volcanic activity at tectonic plate boundaries  along the Pacific Ring of Fire, tsunamis occur most frequently in the Pacific Ocean but are worldwide natural phenomena.

Tsunami in Phuket, Thailand

Japan has the most number of tsunamis recorded in modern history. The most recent one, the 2011 Tohoku tsunami started off as an earthquake of 9.0 magnitude and caused the tsunami which took the lives of almost 16,000 Japanese and got almost 3,000 missing and a total loss ranging from US $14 - US $34 billion.

9.0 magnitude earthquake caused the deadly Tohoku tsunami of 2011 in Japan

Manila in the Philippines had its first taste of its 2013 typhoon season yesterday, June 13, 2013. Massive rain dumped by "habagat," caused street flooding in areas in Manila particularly in Espana and along Taft Avenue where various schools and universities are located.

As if on cue, Philippine stocks went on a plunge the following day, June 14, 2013,  the worst since 2008. Another disaster? This time, man-made.