The worst natural disasters in every state

[Elaine Spencer]

Here's a topic I stumbled across at MSN that I thought might be worth discussing here. This is a slide show that purports to list the all-time worst natural disasters in each of the 50 states:

http://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/topstories/worst-natural-disasters-in-each-state/ss-AA9xKCy

Some are obvious while others are rather surprising. For example, what was the worst natural disaster ever in Illinois? Most of you would probably guess the Tri-State Tornado of 1925, but it turns out that the 1995 Chicago heat wave was far deadlier, with over 700 deaths. There are also some real head-scratchers...

If you don't want to click through the slide show, here is a quick list. I'd be interested in seeing your thoughts or suggestions about the events listed and whether other events should have been listed.

AL -- 2011 tornado outbreak (238 deaths)
AK -- 1964 Good Friday earthquake (139 deaths)
AZ -- 2011 Wallow wildfire (no deaths but 841 sq mi burned)
AR -- 1927 Mississippi River flood (246 deaths)
CA -- 1906 SF earthquake (3,000 deaths, although official death tolls are much lower)
CO -- 1976 Big Thompson Canyon flood (146 deaths)
CT -- 1938 New England hurricane (600 total deaths throughout New England)
DE -- 2006 flood (16 deaths)
FL -- 1928 Okeechobee hurricane (1,836 deaths)
GA -- 1893 Sea Islands hurricane (1,000-2,000 total deaths)
HI -- 1946 earthquake/tsunami (159 deaths)
ID -- 1910 Great Fire (87 total deaths, not all in ID)
IL -- 1995 Chicago heat wave (750 deaths)
IN -- 1913 Indianapolis flood (5 deaths)
IA -- 1940 Armstice Day blizzard (154 deaths "throughout the region" and thousands of cattle lost)
KS -- 1955 Udall tornado (80 deaths)
KY -- 2009 ice storm (35 deaths)
LA -- 1893 Cheniere Caminada hurricane (779 deaths)
ME -- 1998 ice storm (no deaths)
MD -- 1963 Pan Am crash (81 deaths, listed as natural disaster b/c plane was hit by lightning)
MA -- 1938 New England hurricane (99 deaths)
MI -- 1881 "Thumb" forest fire (282 deaths)
MN -- 1918 Cloquet forest fire (452 deaths)
MS -- 2005 Hurricane Katrina (238 deaths)
MO -- 2011 Joplin tornado (158 deaths)
MT -- 1910 Great Fire (87 deaths, not all in MT)
NE -- 1949 blizzard (76 deaths)
NV -- 2005 heat wave (17 deaths)
NH - 1938 New England hurricane (13 deaths)
NJ -- 2012 Hurricane Sandy (43 deaths)
NM -- 2000 Cero Grande fire (no deaths, 400 homes lost)
NY -- 1888 blizzard (200 deaths in NYC alone)
NC -- 1954 Hurricane Hazel (19 deaths)
ND -- 1997 Red River flood (no deaths listed)
OH -- 1913 Great Flood (420-470 deaths)
OK -- 1947 Woodward/Glazier/Higgins tornadoes (113 deaths in OK, 181 total)
OR -- 1903 Heppner flash flood (247 deaths)
PA -- 1889 Johnstown flood (2,200 deaths)
RI -- 1938 New England hurricane (100 deaths)
SC -- 1893 Sea Islands hurricane (1,000-2,000 total deaths)
SD -- 1972 Rapid City flood (238 deaths)
TN -- 1952 tornado outbreak (67 deaths)
TX -- 1900 Galveston hurricane (6,000-12,000 deaths)
UT -- 1999 Salt Lake City tornado (1 death)
VT -- 1927 Great Flood (84 deaths)
VA -- 1969 Hurricane Camille (153 deaths, all from inland flash flooding)
WA -- 1980 Mt. St. Helens eruption (57 deaths)
WV -- 1950 Great Appalachian snowstorm (160 deaths)
WI -- 1871 Peshtigo forest fire (1,500 deaths; occurred same night as Great Chicago Fire)
WY -- 1937 Blackwater fire (15 deaths, all firefighters)

One VERY obvious flaw in this list is that the authors seems not to have heard of the 1974 Super Outbreak, which killed far more than 5 people in IN and, I think, more than 35 people in KY. Not to mention that Katrina killed at least 1,500 people in LA, and I believe there have been tornado outbreaks that killed more than 19 people in NC as well.

Anyway, have at it.

 

[MClarkson]

Missing Katrina in Louisiana is an obvious mistake.

 

[Todd Lemery]

I have one small beef with Wisconsin's. The Peshtigo fire, which burned where my house sits, had a death toll generally thought to be around 2000. The 1,500 people listed is on the low end of estimates. The high side goes around 2,500 deaths. It was the worst fire ever in American history. It was largely overlooked at the time because it happened the same day as the Chicago fire and the only telegraph line to the area was burned off. The fire followed a long drought and was made very violent by an intense low pressure system approaching which fueled the fire with hurricane strength winds. The only building left standing in Peshtigo was a building under constuction. The reason it survived was only the green timber frame had been erected to that point and it was in a large open area.

 

[Michael Gavan]

UT -- 1999 Salt Lake City tornado (1 death)

uh..... http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/slc/projects/disasters/flood_stats/flood_deaths.php
and... http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/slc/projects/disasters/light_stats/light_deaths.html
oh and ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_Utah_snowstorm

 

[Steve Wachholder]

Just a couple of corrections to this article. The Great Palm Beach Hurricane of September 1928 killed 2500 people and not 1836. This is a new number revised by the NHC in the last few years. And the other is Super Cyclone Sandy was no longer a Hurricane when it came ashore along the Jersey Coast back in 2012.

 

[Ethan Schisler]

For Indiana I would think they would have listed the April 11, 1965 tornado outbreak since that killed 138 people in Indiana alone.

 

[Ty Traphagen]

I have a great uncle that died in a flood in the Black Hills of SD. I wonder if it was the same flood listed above...

 

[Skip Talbot]

Pretty poorly researched piece. That's what much of internet media has become these days though. Shoddily put together click bait pieces to sell ads.

 

[John Farley]

There are several other contenders in MO also. It is sometimes hard to tell on older events, since the death records are often less accurate. For example, in the 1896 St. Louis/East St. Louis tornado, at least 255 died - 237 in MO and 118 in IL - but the death toll may have been as high as 400. Some likely died in boats on the Mississippi River with the bodies washed downriver, thus left out of the body count and probably impossible to tell whether MO or IL casualties. Also there were two deadly St. Louis area heat waves, with 153 dead in 1980, and perhaps as many as 420 in 1936. Again some were in MO and some were in IL, but it is likely that the MO total for 1936 is higher than the Joplin death toll.

The list is not right for IA, either. Nearly all the deaths from the 1940 Armstice Day blizzard occurred elsewhere, mainly Minnesota (49) and from shipwrecks/sunk boats on Lake Michigan (59). A likely candidate for Iowa's worst disaster is the Pomeroy tornado of 1893, which killed 71. The Charles City tornado of 1968, which took 13 lives, was also likely deadlier in Iowa than 1940 Armstice Day blizzard.

 

[Andy Berrington]

There are several other contenders in MO also. It is sometimes hard to tell on older events, since the death records are often less accurate. For example, in the 1896 St. Louis/East St. Louis tornado, at least 255 died - 237 in MO and 118 in IL - but the death toll may have been as high as 400. Some likely died in boats on the Mississippi River with the bodies washed downriver, thus left out of the body count and probably impossible to tell whether MO or IL casualties. Also there were two deadly St. Louis area heat waves, with 153 dead in 1980, and perhaps as many as 420 in 1936. Again some were in MO and some were in IL, but it is likely that the MO total for 1936 is higher than the Joplin death toll.

Joplin is still higher in MO going by the most commonly given total, since the St. Louis tornado killed 137 on the MO side of the river.

Also, the tornado outbreak on 3/21/1932 killed more people in AL than 4/27/2011. 268 died in state during that event.

 

[John Farley]

As I said, it is hard to tell on older events. The 137 number for the 1896 tornado could be a lot too low, for the reasons I pointed out in my post. Ranking these events is an inherently difficult, and perhaps somewhat pointless, task. Regardless, the MO toll for the 1936 heat wave probably exceeds either of the tornadoes. Now the tornadoes caused more destruction, but the same point could made in regard to the Chicago heat wave which is ranked above the Tri-State Tornado for IL. I guess my bigger point would be that these rankings are subjective and debatable, and that they are done inconsistently.

 

[Brandon Lawson]

The Joplin, MO tornado on May 22, 2011 is still mind boggling for me. 158 fatalities... Those numbers are unheard of these days for a single tornado. Yeah, sure, there were major tornado disasters back in the 1800's and early 1900's when the general public had very little tornado awareness, if any, and technology was far more limited. You have to go back to 1953 when the Flint, MI tornado killed 115 people, or 1947 when the Woodward, OK tornado killed 181 people to see fatality numbers in excess of 100 from a single tornado. Obviously, the scale of the Alabama outbreak of 2011 was equally incredible, but the Tuscaloosa-Birmingham tornado killed only 65 people in comparison (which is still really high). And since I'm talking about it, 2011 was a ridiculous year for large tornadoes. I think of it as the year of wedges. The months of May and October in 2013 were similar: Rozel, KS; Shawnee & Carney, OK; Moore, OK; Bennington, KS; El Reno, OK; Wayne, NE; and Woodbury/Cherokee County, IA.

 

[Elaine Spencer]

In the original MSN article, 6 of the 50 worst disasters were tornadoes or tornado outbreaks. I would remove the Salt Lake City tornado from the list (that one belongs in the "you gotta be kidding" category) but add 4/11/65 for Indiana, 6/20/57 (Fargo F-5) for North Dakota (10 deaths) and the 3/27/1890 outbreak for Kentucky (The Tornado Project lists 76 deaths from a tornado hitting downtown Louisville in that outbreak, plus another tornado that killed 17 people; these together exceed the 1974 Super Outbreak death toll of 71 in KY).

There's also a possibility that the 1936 F-5 Tupelo tornado could be classed as the deadliest disaster for Mississippi. Officially there were 216 deaths, but deaths among black residents were not reported in newspapers and little if any effort was made to follow up on critically injured black residents who may have died. Attempts to correct for this discriminatory undercounting yield estimates of 235 to 250 deaths in all, which would equal or exceed the Katrina death toll.