You are fortunate, if you are born in the province, where there are no tsunamis, volcanic eruptions and hurricanes. For the inhabitants of some countries, natural disasters are everyday reality. Magazine Popular Mechanics found 8 most life-threatening places to live on our planet.
1. The Cold Pole – Verkhoyansk, Russia
In the taiga, in the heart of Siberia is the oldest city in the Arctic Circle. For more than three centuries, people exist in difficult climatic conditions on the bank of the Yana River, covered by ice 9 months of the year. Today, about 1500 people live in the Cold Pole.
Verkhoyansk claims to be the coldest city on earth. It is difficult to argue with this, taking into account that, the sun shines an average of only 5 hours a day from September to March, and in January and in December it cannot be seen at all. In winter the average temperature in these places is minus 47 degrees Celsius. At the end of XIX century it fell even below, to minus 67.8 degrees.
In Czarist times and in the years of Soviet power Verkhoyansk was a place of exile. Today the city is trying to attract extreme tourists.
2. Mount Merapi, Indonesia
This volcano does not have weekends. Even when there is no eruption a huge column of smoke climbs from its summit into the sky at 3000 meters. Over the past five centuries the Fire Mountain (the name is translated from the local language as fire) “flashed” about 60 times. Last terrible eruption occurred in 2006, before that- in 1994, the deadly cloud of hot gas burned to death 60 people. More than 1000 people died in 1930, when lava ejected by the volcano covered the area of about 13 square kilometers.
Despite all these developments, 200 thousand inhabitants live less than 6 kilometers from the volcano. However, this will surprise no one in Indonesia: 120 million inhabitants of the island of Java have built homes at the foot of some of the 22 active volcanoes.
3. Thunderous Haiti, Gonaïves, Haiti
Here is just the chronicle of 2008: the first came the Tropical Storm “Fay” in August 16, a week later came the turn of Hurricane Gustav, then the island was torn by Hurricanes Hanna and Ike. Within a month, the coastal village of Gonaives – it is among the five largest cities in Haiti – appeared in the epicenter of the tropical cyclone for four times, killing about 500 people, most of the settlement were buried under mud or flooded with water.
In 2004, the hurricane Jeanne visited the city that is home for 104 thousand people. The victims of the third category storm were three thousand Haitians.
Why Gonaives is constantly under attack? The city was erected in the coastal zone, on the shaky foundation of Floodplain Rivers. In addition, local residents, using the wood for the production of coal – the main fuel in these places, cut down forests on the surrounding hills. The roots of the trees impeded the soil, and any rain right now, causes mudslides, landslides.
4. Lake Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda
One of the largest lakes in Africa is on the border between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda. Hidden reservoirs of methane are located under its deep waters. If the deadly gas reaches the surface, a cloud of death covers the houses of 2 million local residents who have settled around the reservoir.
It is quite possible: a similar case had occurred in 80 of the last century in two other African lakes with a similar chemical composition. For example, in 1984, 37 local residents were killed in the Lake Monoun in Cameroon, and three years later a similar incident had happened at Lake Nyos in the same country, where from the effects of toxic gases, 1700 people died. Removing of the gas was provoked, apparently by volcanic activity.
5. Ephemeral Islands, Maldives
10% of the Maldives has become uninhabitable after the 2004 tsunami, which claimed the lives of more than 80 people and left homeless the third of the population. However, even more severe trials are waiting for this state.
Maldives, a confederation of 1,190 islands and atolls in the Indian Ocean, is such a dangerous region that President Mohamed Nasheed after taking office in 2008 proposed the creation of a special fund for the purchase of new land and relocation of indigenous people. The fact is that due to global climate changes and rise of ocean level associated with Maldives will likely submerge in the foreseeable future – in a few decades, because none of the islands rises above the sea level by more than 2 meters.
The Fund is financed by money earned by tourism. As “safe havens” for residents ” of ephemeral islands ‘president calls on India and Sri Lanka, which is strange, because, according to specialists’ forecasts, the Indian subcontinent will be among the first areas affected by changes in sea level.
6. Grand Cayman
Many tourists come to the Caribbean islands for the sake of untouched beaches and diving by the civilization. Cayman Islands – a British territory located south of Cuba – have acquired the image of this tropical paradise. However, they have also other, less attractive name – the world capital of hurricanes. After all, the largest of the three islands of the archipelago suffers from the elements cleared every 2, 16 years – more than any other land in the waters of the Atlantic Ocean.
In 2004, Hurricane Ivan, which was assigned to Category 5, killed on the island 70% of the buildings, 40 thousand people for several days were deprived of electricity and clean water.
7. Magistral for tornadoes, Oklahoma
More than a million people live along the international highway I-44 in the United States, linking the Oklahoma City and Tulsa. Each spring, when cool dry air of the Rocky Mountains descends to the plain and meets the warm moist air from the ocean, along the I-44 there are eddies, and so the locals began to call this line the tornado street.
Since 1890, a tornado tore Oklahoma City and its environs more than 120 times. On May 3, 1999 just 70 vortices were on the state of Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas. The most devastating tornado swept through Oklahoma City, destroyed 1,700 homes and damaged another 6,500 buildings. Despite the modern possibilities of disaster prediction and alarm systems, 40 people were killed, the damage from the hurricane totaled $1 billion.
The longest period without a hurricane – 5 years – was from 1992 to 1998. But then, as if making up for the lost time, 11 of the strongest tornadoes swept for 11 months on this edge.
8. Wandering Deserts of China, Minquin, China
The once fertile oasis now is experiencing turbulent times: it was squeezed between deserts. Ten-year drought, the disappearance of the rivers led to the fact that from the south-east and north-west sands are rapidly moving to the region. Since 1950, the desert has swallowed up more than 160 square kilometers, with the local population increased from 860 thousand to more than two million people over the same period.
Since 2004, the desert approaches to people at a speed of 10 meters per year. An arable land area decreased by six times, and the Chinese government was forced to begin the resettlement of farmers.
