Yes they have, but the frequency of these disasters has been accelerated with our assistance.

@TheoryNumber3 That sunami that killed a quarter of a million people had nothing to do with us. This earthquake had nothing to do with us. The shoddy buildings causing most of the deaths did. Some weather related storms have been intensified because of us. It is a mixed bag. Deadly earthquakes and erupting volcanes are just the planet doing what it has always done and will continue to do.

@Sticks48 No. 1, I didn't say it did. I said that there is a higher incidence of natural disasters in general because of human acitvity, and that is true. " Our sprawling cities and consumption of fossil fuels also have a direct impact on the environment. These activities are also causing changes in global weather patterns, leading to an increase in natural disasters like floods and wildfires. "
[study.com].

@TheoryNumber3 Weather related yes, and l agreed. The other two, which can be way more destructive and deadly, are just the planet doing what it does naturally, and will continue to do until it no longer exists.

I didn't realise you were that young.

@Petter Peter baby, it's not the age, it's the milage.

Holy crap!

Yes I totally agree but we're up against things like this.
Biden was talking about proposed energy standards, and now we're banning stoves according to Fox News
[foxbusiness.com]

@TheoryNumber3 You mean Faux News? Well, they lie! They're just trying to get people angry, because that translates into higher ratings and more money for them.

Anyone who has a gas range can keep right on cooking with it. But gas is being phased out. In some forward-looking jurisdictions, new houses will not have gas-fired water heaters, stoves, or furnaces. This is a good thing.

Natural gas (methane) is a powerful greenhouse gas. Its global warming potential (GWP) is about 60 times that of its combustion product, CO2. Getting the gas from the well to the house is fraught with difficulties, and there are many leaks along the way. By not using gas for cooking, heating water, or heating homes we not only eliminate sources of the greenhouse gases methane and CO2, we also eliminate nitric and nitrous oxides which exacerbate asthma and damage lungs.

There is a new type of electric stove, called an induction stove, that is much cleaner and much more efficient than the old resistance type electric stoves. I plan to get one this year.

@Flyingsaucesir Yes of course I know Fox "New" lies. But that's my point. Every attempt to introduce legislation for new energy standards is reported as a negative by the conservative media and it gets the public, who mostly don't have the brains or initiative to fact check, all in a tizzy over the fake news.

@TheoryNumber3 The sad part is gas stoves do give off noxious fumes due to incomplete buring of the natural gas. If well ventilated it's less of an issue. But I grew with natural gas and I remember the odor.
My little sister had asthma. Mostly I think it has todo with the pipe lines that provide the gas, they're old and gas is very flamable. Flying covered this also.
As to the natural disasters, there are ALOT more people living on that fault line. Same as California.
It's still a sad thing for those folks over there.

@TheoryNumber3 We'll just have to educate them then, won't we? Or they'll just have to get over it. Either way, the burning of fossil fuels has to end, and will end.

@silverotter11 Yes, and that's the sort of thing Biden is trying to legislate to make gas stoves safer and more environmentally friendly.

@TheoryNumber3 DeSantis, that beacon of knowledge, is trying to ban gas stoves in Floriduh ( although they make up less than 8% of cooking appliances because of "emissions''

@TheoryNumber3, @silverotter11 That 'Odor" is ADDED, otherwise your first inkling of a leak would be you in little pieces.

@AnneWimsey The odorant is also added to propane. FUn fact If your propane tanks get covered with snow and the line breaks or is damaged the snow scrubs the odorant from the gas and since propane is heavier than air it will seek the lowest point - like the basement. Sadly this happened to a home in Roslyn last winter. The owner was inside and was killed.
I had propane and I always kept the snow and ice off the tanks, the regulators and hose fittings.

@silverotter11 I was up un San Francisco when there was a huge gas explosion in San Bruno, just to the south of the city in the mid 2000s. It killed several people and burned for a couple of days. Later in the 2000s there was a huge methane leak in Los Angeles County that could be seen with infrared cameras. The plume went for miles, and leaked for weeks before the gas company finally got it under control.

@Flyingsaucesir I remember both of those incidents. Yeah, black pipe and the fittings are great until they are not.

@AnneWimsey He's a diabolical nut case. They made it clear that any new legislation would apply to new stoves only. Nobody is coming after their gas range.

@silverotter11 Exactly.

It's important to note that the increased frequency of natural disasters can also be partly due to improved monitoring and reporting systems, which allow us to track and respond to natural disasters more effectively. Additionally, as populations grow and urbanization continues, the impact of natural disasters is becoming more pronounced, as more people are living in areas that are vulnerable to these events.

@Willow_Wisp The average intensity of storms, the duration of droughts, the acres burned in mega fires, have all been measured over time and objectively observed to have increased. It's not an illusion. Global warming is upon us.

@Flyingsaucesir Earthquakes are entirely different. I have long supported the concerns over global warming. However pointing to earthquakes as evidence isn't honest nor rational.

@Willow_Wisp

That is not the case, I'm afraid. I'm sure you're familiar with fracking.

USGS scientists recently published a report that explains what is causing these seismic events and addresses common misunderstandings. The article is published in the Seismological Research Letters journal.

Fluid Injection Can Cause Earthquakes

[usgs.gov].

@TheoryNumber3 That's about fracking in the US, WTF does that have to do with Turkey?
Only the United States, Canada, China and Argentina extract enough volumes of shale gas and shale oil to market them. The United States is the fastest-growing country in the production of shale oil, using combined techniques of deep vertical-horizontal drilling and hydraulic rock stimulation by fracking.
Almost half of Turkey's gas is imported from Russia. In 2021 gas imports totaled 58 bcm a third of the 46 bcm which came by pipeline was from Russia, but one long-term contract with that country expired at the end of 2021 and the others end in 2025. Of the 58 bcm imported in 2021 26 bcm was from Russia, 9 bcm from Iran (US sanctions on Iran do not apply to pipeline imports of gas),   9 bcm from Azerbaijan, and also 6 bcm of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Algeria. LNG import share varies but typically about a quarter of gas imports are LNG. Total spot import was 6.9 bcm in 2021: spot can also be imported by pipeline. Total entry capacity in 2021 was 362 mcm/day. BOTAŞ imported 56 bcm in 2021; it would like to import from Northern Iraq, but completing the Iraqi part of the pipeline is mired in disputes between the Iraq central government and Kurdistan Regional Government. However some gas in Iraq is wasted by flaring so Iraq would benefit by selling that. Turkey suspects winter cuts in long-term low-price contracted supply from Iran are not technical faults but Iran keeping the gas for its own use. ~ [en.wikipedia.org].

In other words fracking is NOT a significant source of oil production in Turkey.

Yes, they imagined it would make them a super power like the US when they did some test wells in 2018.

My opinion still holds. To be clear fracking doesn't set off deep city killing earthquakes, although they can cause many other small local quakes and undesired effects like flammable drinking water.

@Willow_Wisp That's right, earthquakes are not climate-related (except in the sense that quakes can be caused by fracking, a fossil fuels extraction activity. And, so far, fracking quakes have been small).

@Willow_Wisp Perhaps fracking didn't cause the earthquake in turkey, but my post was about the incidence on natural disasters in general worldwide, and there has been an acceleration of frequency. That has been established.

That is very true. Although there does appear to be a slight increase in activity in the last century?!

Geologists are suggesting that the recession of the glaciers may actually lead to increased seismic activity. This of course is only theory at this point. As with much of the earth science in these unprecedented times….

@Buck The components that make up our environment are all connected. You can't affect one without having an effect on another.

@Buck In upstate NY, where I live, and in southern Canada, our continental plates are still rebounding from the last glaciation.
What happened in Turkey is very tragic. Even a 2,000 year old fortress was partially destroyed. And I just read that an aftershock after a 7.8 earthquake should have been a 6.8. Instead it was a 7.5. (NY Times)
We certainly live in an interesting time.

@TheoryNumber3 Indeed……the full consequences of global warming are far from our scientific understanding. Just what the known variables suggest is frightening in itself…..

@Buck Greenland has or will have rebound with the melting glaciers. And the high volume of fresh water into cold salty water will effect ocean currents. But I don’t know how Europe’s climate will change.

@ADKSparky It was not an "after-shock". It was a second earthquake on an adjacent faultline, that was triggered by the first one. Hence the massive size. Lucky in a way, because had it not been triggered, it might have built up more tension and become even more deadly in a year's time.

@Petter Thanks for the clarification. I didn’t know

@ADKSparky This is rapidly turning into the area's worst ever disaster, with fatalities - so far - exceeding 18,000.

@ADKSparky
The central United States has undergone a dramatic increase in seismicity over the past 6 years. From 1973-2008, there was an average of 24 earthquakes of magnitude 3 and larger per year.

Please see the article I posted above from the USGS, which talks
about the effects of fluid injection (fracking) on earthquake frequency

@TheoryNumber3 I’ve read about quakes in Oklahoma from Fracking. Fracking has been banned in NY

Right, crunching ding dongs suck bigly!!?!