Top 10 deadliest natural disasters in history

A natural disaster is the effect of a natural hazard that affects the environment, and leads to financial, environmental and human losses.

1. 1931 China floods - 1,000,000-2,500,000

2. 1887 Yellow river floods - 900,000-2,000,000

3. 1556 Shaanxi earthquake - 830,000

4. 1970 Bhola cyclone - 500,000

5. 1839 India cyclone - 300,000

6. 2004 Indian ocean tsunami - 230,000-310,000

7. 526 Antioch earthquake - 250,000-300,000

8. 1976 Tangshan earthquake - 242,419-665,000

9. 1920 Haiyuan earthquake - 234,117

10. 1139 Aleppo earthquake - 230,000

Something you should know before I continue is that these numbers are based on death toll not magnitude and they have all occurred in the last 2000 years. Something you may notice is that 5 of the disasters are earthquakes and my theory is that most big cities are located either in valleys that are made because of a fault line. Also lots of people live on the coast of a continent were there are a lot of fault lines.

The Great Barrier Reef

The Great Barrier Reef is located of the coast of Queensland and covers a total area of 133,000 square miles. The Great Barrier reef is comprised of 2,900 individual reefs and over 900 islands. The first recorded discovery of the great barrier reef occurred in 1770 when lieutenant James Cook crashed into it. After that there were many more shipwrecks until it was mapped by the Australian goverment in the early 1900s. Some parts of the Great Barrier Reef are estimated to be over 2 million years old but scientist estimate that most of the reef is around 500,000 years old.

The Great Barrier Reef is home to over 400 different spieces of coral and more then 1500 spieces of fish and new ones are discovered each year. There are 30 spieces of whales dolphins and porpoises in the great barrier reef along with 17 spieces of sea snake and 6 spieces of sea turtle and 215 spieces of birds and 30,000 spieces of crustations in the great barrier reef.

The rivers of northeastern Australia pollute the reef during tropical floods and over ninty percent of this pollution comes from agrucultural fertilizer and pesticide use.

Snake River

Snake River is about a 1000 miles long and covers 108,000 square miles, runs through 6 states Wyoming, Idaho, Nevada, Utah, Oregon and Washington. The thirteenth longest river in the United States. More than 11,000 years ago Native Americans lived along the Snake. The River rises in western Wyoming as a small river flowing west and south into Jackson Hole and runs into the Pacific Ocean.

Snake River Faces a big pollution risk, because huge industrial farms are located near the river that use chemicals, fertilizers, manure which gets washed into the water and destroys the ecosystem. 

Snake River got its name from an American native tribe, the Shoshone tribe. The name Snake River was derived from an S-shape gesture the Shoshone tribe made with their hands to represent swimming Salmon. Explorers misinterpreted it to represent a snake, giving the river its present-day name.  

The Snake River Plain was created by a volcanic hotspot which now lies underneath Yellowstone National Park, the headwaters of the Snake River. 

Yellowstone national park - part 4. - Fishing

Yellowstone Park is managed as a natural area to protect nature. Angling has been a major visitor activity for over a century.
- There are twelve native species including three sport fish: cutthroat, Arctic grayling, and mountain white fish
- Five non-native species and one hybrid: brook trout, brown trout, lake trout, rainbow trout, lake chub, cutthroat/rainbow trout hybrid
- More than 220 lakes comprised approximately 107,000 surface acres in Yellowstone, 94 percent of which can be attributed to Yellowstone, Shoshone, Lewis and Heart lakes.
- 1000 streams make up more than 2650 miles of running water
- Cutthroat trout are a primary food for bald eagles, ospreys, pelicans, otters and grizzly bears.

The native species in Yellowstone are:

Native Fish in Yellowstone

Arctic Grayling

Longnose Sucker

 Mottled Sculpin

 Mountain Sucker

 Mountain White Fish

 Redside Shiner

 Snake River Finespotted Cutthroat Trout

 Speckled Dace

 Utah Chub

 Utah Sucker

 Westlope Cutthroat Trout

 Yellowstone Cutthroat Trout

 Longnose Dace

Yellowstone is where two great rivers originate. The Snake heads to the Pacific via the Columbia River. The Madison River is headwater of the Missouri River, which flows to the Gulf of Mexico. 

One of most well known fish in Yellowstone called Cutthroat Trout. 

Yellowstone national park - part 3. The super Volcano

The Caldera in Yellowstone often called the Super Volcano.
The Caldera is located in the Northwest corner of Wyoming, it measures about 34 by 45 miles. Over the past 2.1 million years the volcano has had three immense explosive volcanic eruptions the blanketed part of the North American continent with ash. The three eruptions occurred 2.1 millions 1.2 million and 640 000 years ago. So it means eruptions occurred in every 800 000 years (this means that you should be ready at 1:38 pm tomorrow).
From 1000 to 3000 earthquakes typically occur each year within Yellowstone park and and its immediate surroundings. Most recently, a devastating earthquake in 1959 killed 28 people and cause $11 million damage.
Over the past 18 million years or so, this hotspot has generated a succession of violent eruptions and less violent floods of basaltic lava.
The Volcanic activities cause about 10 000 thermal features, over 500 are which of geysers. Geysers are hot spring that erupt periodically. The eruption is the result of super-heated water below ground becoming trapped in channels leading to the surface.

These videos are based on facts, although it's fictional, of what it would be like if Yellowstone's super volcano erupted.

There is also a second film, that you can find on Youtube.

sources: http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/yellowstone/yellowstone_hazard_47.html
http://www.earthmountainview.com/yellowstone/yellowstone.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowstone_Caldera

Yellowstone national park part 2.

Yellowstone's fauna


Yellowstone national park is home to a large variety of mammals, birds, fish and reptiles. There is almost 60 species of mammals, 60 species of birds, 18 species of fish, 6 species of reptiles and 4 species of amphibians. 
The rarest mammals in Yellowstone are Mountain lions and lynx, there are only 25 of Mountain lions and lynx haven't been seen since 1989. 


The most common mammals are elk. There are more than 30 000 Elk from different herds. 
We can find other mammals in the park that are very common, like Bison, Coyotes, Wolves, Moose, Bear, Bighorn sheep, Mountain Goats. 


Wolves have a very interesting story in Yellowstone park. They were native to Yellowstone when they established the park in 1872. Between 1914 and 1926 at least a 136 wolves were killed. By the 1970s, scientists found no evidence of a wolf population in Yellowstone. They reintroduced them in 1995. The currently exist in several packs. As the wolf population has grown, the elk population, the favored prey, has declined. 

Stuff about Yellowstone national park, part 1.

I thought about doing this blog on Yellowstone park for two reasons. 

One: We have done all the other posts on "boring" politics, 

Two: Yellowstone park is awesome. 

Yellowstone national park was established in 1872 by president Ulysses  Grant. The park is 3468 square miles that is made up of various geothermal features like geysers, as well as mountains, lakes, canyons and rivers. The Yellowstone area also features many different types of plants and animals. It's located mainly in Wyoming but it also extends into Montana and a little part of Idaho. 

Yellowstone national park lies over a hot spot where light, hot mantel rock rises towards the surface. The Yellowstone Caldera is the largest Volcanic System in North America. 

There are 300 total geysers in the park and a total of at least 10,000 geothermal features altogether. Half the geothermal features and two-thirds of the world's geysers are concentrated in Yellowstone. 

sources: www.travel.nationalgeographic.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowstone_National_Park#Geology

Top ten longest ongoing wars

This time I'm going to write about the ongoing wars around the world.
Some countries just started fighting, and still have history of fighting, while some countries are not fighting at all. And there are some countries that have been part of a war for almost a hundred years.

There are nine major conflicts that are still going on and have more than a 1000 deaths per year.
Something that we should notice about the wars of these countries, is that all of them are internal.
This is the list of the nine countries that are still fighting (not on and off).

- Columbia is located in northwestern America and has been fighting since 1964 and has about 200 thousand deaths. Fighting has been going between the Colombian government and the revolutionary arm forces of Columbia and the national liberation army.

- Afghanistan is located in the Middle East, and has been fighting since 1978. Fighting has been going on between different warlords for the country's control and recently in 2000, the US also entered the war. Has had 3 million deaths.

- Somalia has been fighting for 21years. Somalia is fighting for the control of the country. And has about 400 thousand deaths.

- War in Pakistan started in 2004 and ever since has been going on. Has almost 39 thousand deaths.

- In Mexico, 60 thousand people has been killed. The armed conflicts are between rival drug cartles that are fighting each other for regional control, and Mexican government forces.

- Sudanese nomadic conflicts have been going on since 2009 and has been between the nomadic tribes, the fights are breaking out over resources, including land, cattle and drinking water. Sudanese war has had 6 thousand deaths.

- Sudan internal conflict started in 2011, it is between the Army of Sudan and the Sudan revolutionary front for liberation. The war had around 2000 deaths.

- The Syrian uprising is a violent internal conflict with 10 thousand deaths.

- Iraq insurgency has been going on since 2011 and has about a 1500 deaths. Iraq insurgency after U.S. withdrawal relates to continuing violent terror activities by Iraq.

sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ongoing_conflicts
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War

Top Ten Most Corrupt countries in the World

This post will be about the most corrupt countries in the world.

According to multiple websites the most corrupt country in the world is Somalia.
Number two is North Korea.
Number three is Myammar.
 Number four is Afghanastan.
Number five is Uzbekistan.
Number six is turkmenistan.
Number seven is Sudan
Number eight is Iraq
Number nine is Haiti
 Number ten is Venezuela. 


Now the top ten least corrupt countries are the following: 
The least corrupt country in the world is New Zealand
Number two is Denmark 
Number three is Finland 
Number four is Sweden 
Number five Singapore 
Number six is Norway 
Number seven is Netherlands 
Number eight is Australia 
Number nine is Switzerland 
Number ten is Canada 


Comparing the most corrupted country with the least corrupt country:


Somalia is located in the horn of Africa and its government is under Socialist rule by a Transitional Federal goverment but it only controls a small part of the country and the rest is controlled by multiple warlords thus making Somalia one of the poorest and most violent and corrupt states in the world.

New Zealand's is an island country located in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses. The government is constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary democracy, but similar to Britain, the King and Queen are more of a symbol, they don't have actual real power. It is a capitalist country. 

While Somalia is having battles and internal fights New Zealand have a stable government and no internal fights.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index

Comparing America's public transportation to Europe's… YAY!

I got the idea from someone I met from Hungary. I asked her what she thought was different between the USA and Europe. The first thing she said was that there was a lot less public transportion compared to Europe.
So now let's talk about public transportation! There are nine main ways of public transportation that I can think of(if you can think of any more, please put it in the comments).
The ways are:
Metro cable lifts,  Buses, Ferry, Trains, Tram, Trolley, Taxi, Airplane, Subway.
In the USA only 43 million people who use public transportation (thats only 14 percent of the population).

While in Europe there are 700 million people who use public transportation ( thats about 95 percent of the population).