Man-Made Environmental Disasters

In February 2006, a deadly rockslide-debris avalanche befell my fellow Filipino compatriots in Southern Leyte province of the Philippines following more than a week long heavy rains and a minor earthquake measuring 2.6 on the Richter scale causing widespread destruction and loss of life. Loose rock and soil debris buried the mountain village of Guinsaugon in the town of Saint Bernard including an entire elementary school of around 250 students in session. Around 200 had been confirmed dead but more than 1,500 are still missing to this day. Deforestation of the area by illegal loggers and extensive mining in the area three decades earlier had taken its toll, and together with the heavy rains and earthquake created the perfect combination for such a disaster to happen. Indeed, this was a very disturbing result of irresponsible exploitation of the earth’s natural resources.

Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

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War positively has damaging effects on our environment. Whether the atomic bombings of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 and Nagasaki three days later are justified or not is still very much debated today. But one thing for sure, it led to the surrender of the once militaristic nation of Japan, officially ending World War II. It was estimated that around 140,000 and 70,000 died from radiation poisoning and burns in Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively in 1945 alone. Who knows how many thousand more have died from injuries and sickness attributable to radiation exposure released by the bombs in the succeeding decades.

Agent Orange

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Between 1961 and 1971, during the Vietnam Conflict, the United States military under its Herbicidal Warfare Program sprayed more than 10 million gallons of Agent Orange, a potent defoliant and herbicide containing dioxin, over large areas of South Vietnam to destroy forests and crops that provided cover for Viet Cong guerrillas. Dioxin exposure, whether directly or indirectly through ingestion of food grown on affected soil, has been linked to a variety of cancers, blood and nerve disorders. Increased occurrence of birth defects, infant death, mental retardation and childhood cancers in the area have been noted. This herbicide is still causing indescribable sufferings to war veterans and civilians more than 3 decades after the conclusion of Vietnam War.

Landmines

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Landmines are devices designed to explode in the presence or contact of any moving object. There are around 100 million of these explosive devices entrenched into the ground during conflicts all over the world, particularly in Southeast Asia, South America and Africa. They are not only murderers and maimers of innocent civilians long after conflicts have ceased; they have also contributed to the destruction of wildlife, resulting in disruption to a region’s ecological balance. Due to fear, arable lands are left untilled, depriving people of livelihood. In time, their corrosion and possible leakage of heavy metals and toxic substances will pollute rivers and degrade soil.

Global Warming

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Global Warming is one issue that has raised much concern today. There is no longer any question about who’s to blame for our current predicament. There is mounting evidence that human carelessness toward nature have resulted in the increase of the Earth’s average temperature due to steadily rising concentration of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, since the Industrial Revolution took effect in the late eighteenth century. Not only that, global warming has dreadful consequences, which have become more apparent in recent years; they include rapidly melting polar ice caps that cause sea levels to rise; increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events (floods, droughts, super typhoons, etc); mass specie extinctions; and widespread epidemics, among others. Although not all these events can be directly traced to global warming, but many scientists are convinced that they will become more frequent, should the world’s temperature continue to increase.

More history articles:

• Mighty Women
• Warrior Women
• Man-made Environmental Disasters
• Rocks and Stones with Historical, Cultural and Religious Significance
• Famous Teen Deaths
• Birthday Deaths
• Famous Holocaust Survivors
• Heroes of the Holocaust & Their Stories of Courage 1
• Heroes of the Holocaust & Their Stories of Courage 2
• 10 Bizarre Deaths in History
• 10 (More) Bizarre Deaths in History
• 10 (Ultimate) Bizarre Deaths in History