Impact
The coast of the Bay of Bengal is particularly vulnerable to the effects of tropical cyclones, and there have been at least six cyclones to hit the region that killed over 100,000 people in total. The 1970 Bhola cyclone was not the most powerful of these, however; the 1991 Bangladesh cyclone was significantly stronger when it made landfall in the same general area with 250 km/h (160 mph) winds, a high-end Category 4.
The 1970 cyclone is nonetheless the deadliest tropical cyclone on record and is one of the deadliest natural disasters in recent history. The exact death toll will never be known, but it is estimated that between 300,000 and 500,000 people lost their lives. A comparable number of people died as a result of the 1976 Tangshan earthquake and the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake, but because of uncertainty in the number of deaths in all three disasters, it may never be known which one was the deadliest.
Read more about this topic: 1970 Bhola Cyclone
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