Today, the Storm Flood of 1962 forms an integral part of local and national memory culture. Public commemoration events, monuments, and media coverage assure that the disaster is not forgotten.
During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, massive floods regularly threatened cities and settlements along the Danube River. The introduction of wide-reaching telegraph networks enabled Habsburg authorities in Vienna to protect the most important city of the empire.
The first cholera epidemic in St. Petersburg, then capital of the Russian Empire, brought to light the city’s enormous sanitary problems. During the course of the epidemic 12,540 people sickened and 6,449 died.
In 1969, the Georgian resort of Pitsunda and its beach were severely damaged by a storm. This was largely due to an ongoing process of coastal erosion caused by anthropogenic influences.
In 2014 and 2015 the Methow Valley in Washington State experienced the largest wildfires in the state’s history.
Brisbane’s 1974 floods substantially damaged Brisbane, accelerating the government’s plans for a second flood mitigation dam.
Flood memory in Townsville is strong, but this does not align with the city’s capacity to live sustainably with floods.
Ecoanxiety in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein signals our ability to create art in reaction to environmental disaster in increasingly unstable planetary futures.
