Manmade Disasters 101: Deadly Human Activities

Manmade disasters are as devastating and deadly as natural disasters or even deadlier. Human activities can trigger environmental disasters leading to a much bigger catastrophic situation. Technological advancements, chemical experimentation, accidents, carelessness, etc. lead to man-made disasters.

It is very necessary but very difficult to control disasters that occur by human activities. They leave a long term adverse effect on biodiversity. The novel coronavirus pandemic, as believed by some people, results from human acts of biological experiments and biological warfare tactics, but it is not yet proven.

Could coronavirus be a manmade disaster?

There are many theories about the origin of coronavirus.

• Some people suggest that coronavirus is a zoonotic virus that accidentally got passed on from animals to humans.
• Others suggest that it is a bioweapon under the act of biological warfare just like the plague, which is being waged upon the world by China.
• Some scientists also mentioned that America along with scientists from other countries were working on the SARS virus, which got leaked from the laboratory by a Chinese scientist.

But practically, the origin of the virus can not get traced. Although WHO has been trying to find the origin since the start, but because there is no statutory scientific body dedicated to this field, this is not possible.

• Scientists around the world have studied the viruses, and in the absence of a global authority, this allows people to plan and distribute ‘alternative or false information’.
• There is no authenticity assigned to these scientific studies, and political interests have challenged and consumed scientific claims.
• If there was ever a bioweapon attack, the chances of it being thoroughly investigated would depend more on political whims rather than a scientific approach.

Let’s look at different kinds of Manmade disasters.

Atomic and Chemical Disasters

Although they’ve been rare since the discovery of nuclear fission during the 1930s, there have been some incidences where the actions to tackle nuclear energy have gone wrong. These manmade disasters leave miles of land dreadful for quite a long time or even hundreds of years. Chemical leaks from factories, industries, and laboratories are deadly for humans and other species, leaving long-term disabilities even in their future generations.

Visit here to look at some deadly nuclear and chemical disasters.

Industrial accidents

Mines, manufacturing industries, experimental laboratories, and other factories have been in history’s most exceedingly terrible mishaps. These spots can contain unstable materials or experience gigantic structural problems because of the work directed there. In most pessimistic situations, these manmade accidents can experience the ill effects of blasts and collapses, prompting death toll and possible ecological harm.

The latest manmade industrial blast occurred in Beirut, Lebanon, killed many people and destroyed much of the city.

https://twitter.com/butt3rm3biscuit/status/1292450039219064833?s=20

List of deadly historical accidents: Industrial accidents, explosions, mining disasters, oil spills, and food contamination.

Structural collapses

Structural disasters have been most common among all other disasters. We can see buildings, houses, hotels, etc. properties being collapsed due to many reasons most of them because of humans, such as:

• Corruption
• Carelessness
• No proper planning
• Use of incorrect or defective materials
• Manufacturing errors, etc.

These manmade disasters result from extreme ignorance and selfishness.

Look at some historical structural failures here.

War and Terrorism

Human nature often leads to conflicts and conflicts on a national and international level lead to wars. Terrorism and war are in a way similar as both include:

• Severe destruction
• Deaths
• Bad intentions
• Use of heavy weapons’
• Collateral damage

Instead of talking, communicating, solving the conflicts people choose to have violence and think that might solve their problem.

In wars, countries, and armies wreak havoc on each other and even on innocents and the environment. Genocides, Biological warfare, fires, terrorism, etc.

See the list of major terror attacks here.

See biological warfare here and here.

List of genocide incidents.

Transportation Accidents

Any individual who’s driven a vehicle realizes that getting from direct A toward point B can now and again be perilous. Blunders in judgment and animal interference can cause major issues. At the point when these issues happen with mass travel vehicles like trains, these become disastrous.

Different sources of transportation were invented to make human life easy but people instead of using it carefully and efficiently, they are using to do disasters day by day. Every other day we see  news of accidents due to driver’s alcohol consumption, or high speed driving, or train wreak etc. Accidents not only happens on road but on railway tracks, water ways, air ways, or any means of transportation due to negligence, poor coordination, any other reason.

Look at disastrous transportation incidents. Of road, rail, air, and water.

Human activities leading to natural calamities.

Humans can’t realize that their blunders are doing a mess to the nature and this mess would be very dangerous to us. Assuming that nature would not be doing anything is very big misconception humans have. Some mistakes/blunders humans are continuously making are:

• Deforestation to build infrastructure, food farms, transportation routes, factories, etc. leaves the area vulnerable to floods and famine.
• Construction of dams in earthquake-prone areas leads to disastrous flooding.
• Farming, deforestation, and animal husbandry in Brazil have recently led to uncontrollable forest fires in the Amazon rainforest burning around 22.4 million acres of the forest.
• Destruction of natural wetlands.

We always see humans highly depend on materialistic things, orthodox practices, greed, which is the major reason for our suffering. Environmentalists and peacemakers behind, trying hard, fail at the hands of their higher authorities and governments.

These human activities have lead to many natural calamities such as:

1. Floods
2. Earthquakes
3. Global warming
4. Land slides
5. Forest fires
6. Hurricanes
7. Drying lakes
8. Tsunami
9. Droughts
10. Unpredictable rains and rising temperature

what can we do to lower the manmade disasters?

We as humans are tend to do mistakes but are also capable of realizing and make a step towards correcting the mistakes. Here are some common and easy things you can do to prevent any of the above stated natural calamities/ disasters:

1. Plant more trees, so that the floods, landslides, earthquakes can be prevented.
2. A proper planning before undergoing any of the projects.
3. Not creating dams where not possible.
4. Using biodegradable things in daily life.
5. Using methods such as car pooling to prevent global warming.
6. Use of transportation with due care.

Conclusion:

Despite of these manmade disasters there has been some countries where people are happy. According to Global Peace Index 2020 Iceland is the most peaceful country in the world since 2008, followed by New Zealand, Austria, Portugal, and Denmark. But on the other according to the same index the Russia is the most dangerous country to live in.

In conclusion we can say that humans make mistakes and blunders but doing the same again and again is not a sign of intelligence. By following the preventive measures we can lower the level of disasters and make Earth a better place to live instead of finding any other planet to survive.

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