Within hours, Hurricane Mitch kills 10,000 people IMAGE GALLERY: A sign of the times?

June 24, 1999
Web posted at: 10:19 p.m. EDT (0219 GMT)

In this story: Vulnerable shantytowns proliferate Insurance companies abandon storm-ravaged region RELATED STORIES, SITES

From Correspondent Michael Skinner

(CNN) -- The new millennium will likely usher in an age of "super disasters" that may stretch thin the world's aid resources, according to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

In a report released Thursday, the Red Cross blamed a number of factors -- some man-made -- for the trend toward larger disasters.

Vulnerable shantytowns proliferate

Among the problems cited were global climate change and the migration of millions of people from the countryside to urban areas, which creates crowded shantytowns easily destroyed by fire or flood.

Last year, the Red Cross says there were more disasters than during any other year on record, from floods in Central America to drought in Sudan, forest fires in Brazil and tidal waves in the South Pacific.

And weather, not war, created most of the world's refugees, as natural disasters made the lands where they resided unlivable.

"Five years ago, we were assisting about half a million people in flooding. Last year, it was 5.5 million," said Peter Walker, head of international management for the Red Cross federation.

Some facts fueling the Red Cross' nervous assessment: 40 of the world's 50 fastest-growing cities are located in earthquake zones; half the earth's population now lives in coastal areas; and 10 of the warmest years of the century occurred in the last 15 years.

A frightening image of the potential "super disasters" to come was Hurricane Mitch, which devastated Central America in the fall of 1998.

Insurance companies abandon storm-ravaged region

Not only did the hurricane kill 10,000 people, it also wiped out nearly two-thirds of the Honduran economy -- more than $7 billion in damage in that country alone. In the aftermath, many insurance companies pulled out of the region, leaving only emergency relief aid -- which has dropped 40 percent over the last five years.

"If we can be more proactive on disasters -- the way we fund them, the way we plan for them -- then we can have better preparedness, we can have more efficient responses, and the assistance is more effective in the end," Walker said.

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