nesota, Kansas, Wisconsin, Iowa, southern Ne-
braska, and Missouri. The rainfall totals were 12
inches above normal. Hundreds of levees broke
along the Missouri and Mississippi rivers, severely
disrupting both land transportation, through the
flooding of highways and the destruction of bridges,
and barge traffic, with hazardous waterways making
movement impossible for more than seven weeks.
In Canada, the twelve provinces and territories
experienced 170 floods during the twentieth cen-
tury, with 62 percent of the disasters occurring in
Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick, and Quebec. In
the last decade of the century, floods affected the
eastern regions of Canada, northwestern and south-
western British Columbia, and southern Manitoba.
Most of the flooding in the 1990’s happened in the
southern part of Ontario and Quebec, where the
population is highly concentrated. In the west, Man-
itoba and the city of Winnipeg suffered flooding in
1993, when three episodes of intense rainfall oc-
curred from July 25 to August 14, causing extensive
damage to agricultural land infrastructure, roads,
homes, and power lines. Four years later, the Winni-
peg, Red, and Assiniboine rivers again overtopped
their banks between April and May, 1997, as a result
of the spring melting of snow. It took seven weeks for
the 7,000 military personnel sent to the rescue to
help relocate more than 25,000 people who had
been evacuated from their homes.
Hurricanes and Tornadoes During the decade,
1,653 people in the United States and 29 people in
Canada lost their lives as a result of wind storms,
which have their most dramatic expression in hurri-
canes, tornadoes, and tropical storms.
Nineteen hurricanes affected the United States
in the 1990’s: Bob and Grace in 1991; Andrew, Axel,
and Iniki in 1992; Emily and Wylie in 1993; Alberto
in 1994; Opal and Erin in 1995; Fran in 1996; Danny
in 1997; Bonnie, Frances, and George in 1998; and
Brett, Floyd, Irene, and Dennis in 1999. The worst of
them was Hurricane Andrew, which caused exten-
sive damage to Florida, Louisiana, and the Bahamas.
Forty-four people perished, fifty-five were injured,
and a quarter million were left homeless after the
passage of the storm. The total property loss ex-
ceeded $30 billion. Hurricane Floyd destroyed
property worth $4.5 billion, followed (in cost) by
Fran with $3.2 billion in losses, Opal with $3 billion,
Bob with $1.5 billion, Bonnie with $720 million, Erin
with $700 million, and Alberto and Frances with
$500 million each.
More than 95 percent of the tornadoes of the
world occur in the United States. Tornadoes are a
yearly event in Tornado Alley, stretching from Texas
through Indiana and into Ohio. An unusual concen-
tration occurred, however, when a swarm of torna-
does hit fifteen states between May 16 and 19, 1995,
causing $10 billion in damage, killing three people,
and injuring sixty-seven. In Canada, there were two
tornadoes the 1990’s. On August 5, 1994, a tornado
near Ottawa injured four people and affected an-
other three hundred, and on July 6, 1999, a tornado
in Drummondville (Quebec) two hundred people
were left homeless and four thousand more re-
ported damages.
Extreme Temperatures During the 1990’s, five
heat waves (1990, 1993, 1995, 1998, and 1999) killed
1,116 people in North America and cost over $5 bil-
lion in energy usage, crop damage, and water usage.
Periods of record cold temperatures affected the
United States in 1990, 1993, 1994, and 1995 in Wash-
ington, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Ten-
nessee, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina,
New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut. During
these colder periods, blizzards affected a large area
of the center of the United States. Winter weather
was ranked second after floods by the number of fa-
talities caused in 1996 and in 1997, and 1996 had the
record number of blizzards with twenty-eight. These
blizzards, which combined very cold temperatures
and blowing snow, caused more than $500 million in
damage. Among the cities that sustained the largest
number of casualties were Atlanta, Detroit, Philadel-
phia, Chicago, and Milwaukee, where forty people
lost their lives. In 1998, a large-scale ice storm caused
$4.2 billion in damage in Ontario and Quebec.
Drought and Wildfires During the decade, two sig-
nificant periods of drought were reported in the
United States. A seven-month period in 1991 pro-
duced droughts that affected California, Pennsyl-
vania, and Maryland and cost $1.3 billion. In the
summer of 1999, Kentucky, Maryland, Ohio, Penn-
sylvania, and Virginia suffered a drought resulting in
$800 million in damage. While drought in Canada
has been the most expensive natural disaster over
the past two hundred years, no significant events
were reported in the 1990’s.
Wildfires affected California repeatedly every608 Natural disasters The Nineties in America