Greatest hits of billion dollar disasters of 2012.
The country saw a preliminary total of eleven billion-dollar weather disasters in 2012, according to a report released by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). This follows a disastrous 2011, which contained a record fourteen billion-dollar weather disasters in records dating to 1980.
Though final reliable damage estimates are still being calculated, NOAA says that it’s likely that the total cost of the disasters in 2012 will exceed 2011 even with three fewer total billion-dollar weather events. This is because of the very high losses still being tallied up for both the national drought disaster and Hurricane Sandy.
In addition to the national drought and Sandy, here are the other nine billion-dollar weather disasters of 2012:
- Western Wildfires (summer/fall) – Wildfires burned more than 9.1 million acres in the U.S. in 2012. The most damaging wildfires were in the western states. (Photos of the Waldo Canyon fire near Colorado Springs)
- Hurricane Isaac (August) – Storm surge flooding, rainfall flooding, strong winds and a few tornadoes pounded the northern Gulf Coast in August. (More on Isaac)
- Plains/East/Northeast Severe Storms (June 29-July 2) – A large amount of the damage was associated with a massive derecho that roared from parts of Ohio and Indiana to the mid-Atlantic. (Photos of the derecho)
- Rockies/Southwest Severe Weather (June 6-12) – Damaging hail and 25 tornadoes struck parts of Colorado, New Mexico and Texas. More than $1 billion in hail damage for Colorado alone.
- Southern Plains/Midwest/Northeast Severe Storms (May 25-30) – 27 confirmed tornadoes along with significant damage from high winds and large hail.
- Midwest/Ohio Valley Severe Storms (April 28-May 1) – A total of 38 confirmed tornadoes along with major damage from large hail. This includes significant damage from large hail in St. Louis, Mo.
- Midwest tornadoes (April 13-14) – Tornado outbreak in Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska and Iowa. 98 tornadoes were confirmed in the outbreak. (See photos)
- Texas Tornadoes (April 2-3) – A total of 22 confirmed tornadoes including many that touched down in the Dallas/Ft. Worth metro area. (See photos)
- Southeast/Ohio Valley tornadoes (March 2-3, 2012) – A total of 75 tornadoes were confirmed from Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky to Tennessee, Georgia and Alabama. (Archive: Outbreak as it happened)
Below – more evidence of how the looney right will be processing this.
“Only when the last tree has died, the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught will we realize that we cannot eat money.”
Isn’t their god telling us to stop emitting greenhouse gases?
Have you seen a summary of the total monetary costs of these disasters? That number will, I expect, be dominated by the value for Sandy; I’ve seen estimates for Sandy’s damage as low as $20 billion and as high as $70 billion.