21st Century Zombie: Catastrophic Natural Disasters - Essay Sample

Introduction

The experience of a devastating occurrence compels people to think of an apocalypse. The occurrence of natural disasters could be the zombie in the 21st century (Pirot, 2019). Catastrophic natural disasters that have shaken the world include earthquakes, hurricanes, disasters, floods, and volcanic eruptions, among others.

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Earthquakes happen severally but experiencing a quake with a magnitude of 8 or even higher is a real rehearsal for the end of the world (Fountain, 2017). The earthquake that occurred in Haiti in 2010 was the deadliest in the 21st century that claimed the lives of 300,000 people. The quake and tsunamic that took place in Japan in 2011 had a magnitude of 9 and claimed the lives of about 18,000 people (Parry, 2017). The occurrence of such an earthquake of one of a bigger magnitude an earthquake would claim the lives of many people and the destruction of many properties. Hurricanes can be destructive due to their strength and size. Such natural disasters can as well overturn parts of the land clearing and burying many people. The clearance of people and their property brings to an end to the civilizations that had been established.

Bush fires such as the ones that occur in Australia comes a long with catastrophic consequences that affect the socioeconomic development of the country. The frequency of the fires has been increasing in the past 7 years. By September 2019, the bush fire had burnt at least 27 million hectares of New South Wales which is three times larger than the Amazon fires that only burnt 906,000 hectares the same year. Australia's temperatures are continuously increasing and the continent by more than 1 C annually since 1910. High temperatures reached include 46.4 C in Melbourne in 2009 (Yu et al., 2020).

Volcanic eruptions can quickly put an end to a generation that was profoundly hopeful to see their future. Eruptions can be gigantic like the one that occurred at Krakatoa. Another example is the eruption of Mount Vesuvious that occurred in 79AD, which wiped and buried Pompeii city, a resident of approximately 11,000 people. The earthquake and tsunamic that took place in Japan in 2011 had a magnitude of 9 and claimed the lives of about 18,000 people (Parry, 2017). Whenever such disasters occur, they interrupt the present civilizations hence making their progress redundant. Natural disasters eliminate the major and advanced civilizations of the world, such as the Maya and ancient Shu Civilization (Pirot, 2019).

References

Fountain, H., 2017. Apocalyptic Thoughts Amid Nature's Chaos? You Could Be Forgiven. The New York Times, [online] Available at: <https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/08/us/hurricane-irma-earthquake-fires.html> [Accessed 9 April 2020].

Parry, R., 2017. The school beneath the wave: the unimaginable tragedy of Japan's tsunami. The Guardian, [online] Available at: <https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/24/the-school-beneath-the-wave-the-unimaginable-tragedy-of-japans-tsunami> [Accessed 9 April 2020].

Pirot, F., 2019. A rule of natural disasters coming to rebalance unjust development and irresponsibility-laws of physics explain the trope of "Divine Retribution" against the "Nouveaux Riches". International Journal of Physics, vol. 7, no. 4, pp.135-140. viewed 09 April 2020, http://article.internationaljournalofphysics.com/pdf/IJP-7-4-4.pdf

Yu, P., Xu, R., Abramson, M., Li, S., & Guo, Y. (2020). Bushfires in Australia: a serious health emergency under climate change. The Lancet Planetary Health, 4(1), e7-e8. https://doi.org/10.1016/s2542-5196(19)30267-0