Cyclone Nargis

I always pay closer attention to news regarding natural disasters, because they've always held a certain fascination with me. And, because I'm a numbers freak, I always throw things into perspective by comparing them to other similar events.

The current death toll of that cyclone is 4,000. That's a tragedy, but let's compare it to other natural disasters.

The worst cyclone in history happened in 1970, in Bangladesh, and killed 500,000 people.

Expanding our natural disasters to more than just cyclones, the Yellow River in China flooded in 1931, and killed 4 million people.

Let's go the polar opposite of floods. The 1921-1922 drought in the Soviet Union killed 5 million people.

How about we throw in "human error". Because of the mismanagement of China's economy during the Great Leap Forward, 45 million people starved to death in the ensuing famine.

And let's not forget the greatest killer of all. The Black Plague killed 75 million people in the 1300s.

While we're on the topic, allow me to share with you my favorite type of natural disaster. Only two cases of this have been reported in recorded history. It's called a Limnic Eruption.

A limnic eruption occurs when a huge concentration of CO2 forms in a lake, and then erupts like someone opened a soda pop can. The release of CO2 suffocates all living things in the vicinity of the lake. The worst case happened in the 1980's, at a lake in Cameroon. 1800 people suffocated and died.