Topic 1 - Hazardous Earth

Question 1

What is the name of the Hurricane that took place in South east USA?

Answer 1

Hurricane Katrina

Question 2

What magnitude was hurricane Katrina on?

Answer 2

Category 3 at landfall

Question 3

What date was Hurricane Katrina on?

Answer 3

29th August, 2005

Question 4

What is the name of the cyclone that hit Myanmar?

Answer 4

Cyclone nargis

Question 5

What magnitude was Cyclone Nargis on

Answer 5

Category 4 at landfall

Question 6

What date did Cyclone Nargis take place on?

Answer 6

2nd May, 2008

Question 7

What impacts did Hurricane Katrina have on the people?

Answer 7

• More than 1800 people were killed
• 300 000 houses were destroyed and hundreds of thousands of people were made homeless
• 3 million people where left without electricity
• 230 000 jobs were lost from damaged businesses

Question 8

What impacts did Cyclone Nargis have on the people?

Answer 8

• More than 140 000 people were killed
• 450 000 houses were destroyed and 350 000 were damaged
• Around 65% of rice paddies in the Irrawaddy delta were damaged, which led to a loss of livelihoods
• a lot of people suffered from diseases caused by poor sanitary conditions and contaminated water.

Question 9

How did Hurricane Katrina impact the environment?

Answer 9

• Coastal habitats such as sea turtle breeding beaches were damaged
• some coastal conservation areas were destroyed
• flooding damaged oil refineries in Louisiana, causing massive oil spills

Question 10

How did Cyclone Nargis cause impacts on the environment?

Answer 10

• 14000km squared of land was flooded
• 38000 hectares of mangrove forests were destroyed
• the flooding caused erosion and salination (increased salt content) of land

Question 11

What did the defences do in New Orleans to stop the impacts of hurricane Katrina?

Answer 11

• New Orleans flood defences (e.g. embankments) that were supposed to protect the city failed this caused widespread flooding (over 80% of the city was underwater)

Question 12

What defences helped stop the impacts of Cyclone Nargis?

Answer 12

• mangrove forests protected the coast from flooding, but loads had been chopped down in the decade before Nargis had hit, reducing the natural protection

Question 13

What warning and evacuation processes took place before Hurricane Katrina hit?

Answer 13

• The NHC issued a hurricane warning on 26th August for Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. It continued to track the hurricane, updating the government on where it would hit.
• 70-80% of New Orleans residents were evacuated before the hurricane reached land. This reduced the number of people killed because lots of people had left the areas where the hurricane would hit

Question 14

What warning and evacuation processes took place before Cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar?

Answer 14

• Indian weather agencies warned the government of Myanmar that Cyclone Nargis was likely o hit the country 48 hours before it did
• warnings were issued on the TV and radio but did not reach people in poor rural communities. This meant people were killed because they didn’t know what to do or where to evacuate to
• no emergency preparation plans, no evacuation plans and the country didn’t have an early warning system

Question 15

What forecasting took place before Hurricane Katrina hit?

Answer 15

• The USA has a sophisticated monitoring system to predict if (and where) a hurricane will hit
• The national hurricane centre (NHC) in Florida tracks and predicts hurricanes using satellite images and planes that collect weather data on approaching storms

Question 16

What forecasting took place before Cyclone Nargis hit?

Answer 16

• Myanmar doesn’t have a radar network that can predict the height of storm surges and waves caused by cyclones
• Myanmar doesn’t have a dedicated monitoring centre for tropical cyclones