*Tsunami

• Tsunami is a large and destructive water wave. one of the most powerful and feared natural disasters, a tsunami can challenge a jet super fast airplane for speed and a three-story building for height, packing enough energy to destroy an entire coastal community in moments. Although seismic events such as earthquakes or volcanic eruptions are the most common cause of tsunamis, the impact of cosmic bodies, such as meteorites can generate the formidable waves as well.

*Tornado

• A tornado is a small-diameter column of violently rotating air that develops within a convective cloud and remains in contact with ground.

Tornadoes occur most often in association with thunderstorms during the spring and summer in the mid –latitudes of both the northern and southern Hemispheres. The tornadoes can generate strong winds with speeds estimated in the range of 500 km per hour. When winds of this magnitude strike a populated area, they can cause great destruction and loss of life, main through injuries from flying debris and collapsing structures. Sometimes they are called twisters.

*Hurricane

• Tropical cyclonic storms are characterized by very low atmospheric pressures in the calm, clear center of a circular structure of rain, could and every high winds. In the western Atlantic and the Caribbean they are called hurricanes.

An average hurricane has tremendous energy. In one day energy released is about 1. 6 x 1013 kilowatt-hours or at least 8,000 times more than the electrical power generated each day in the United States. This quantity is equivalent to a daily explosion of 500, 000 atomic bombs of the 20-kiloton Nagasaki variety. Hurricanes can cause widespread destruction and human misery.

*Cloudburst

• A cloudburst is a sudden violent rainstorm falling for a short period of time limited to a small geographical area. The rain falls at 100 mm or more per hour.

A cloud burst over Mumbai on some years back and it rained incessantly for several days. The city faced the breakdown of service and drainage systems and failure of power supply in large areas in and around the city. Thousands of lives were lost in the tragic incidents which caught people unaware.