Week 1 The difference between between hazards, disasters, and catastrophes

   Aaron Flores

Hazards, disasters, and catastrophes are not what you want to see on your local news channel.  They are all potential threats to the community/world, but differentiate from each other in levels of danger. A hazard is a potential process or event that is a threat to human life and property.  Some examples include earthquakes and volcanoes.  An event only becomes a hazard when human life is in the way.  A disaster is a hazardous event that is far more dangerous.  An event is considered a disaster when more than 10 people are killed, more than 100 people are affected, and when it is a declared state of emergency.  Lastly, the most dangerous of the three, a catastrophe requires a significant amount of money to fix and many years for recovery.  One example of a Catastrophe was Hurricane Katrina, which cost 100 billion dollars and is considered the largest catastrophe in the U.S.  Therefore, hazards, disasters, and catastrophes are all hazardous events because they involve the risk of loss of human life, but differ in level of danger and how funds and damage will be once the hazardous event strikes.