Cyclone Tracy

Early on Christmas Day of 1974, the city of Darwin in the north of Australia was hit by a category 4 cyclone. Cyclone Tracy was rather small in size but very intense, with wind speeds of more than 217 km/h. It is recorded as one of the worst natural catastrophes in Australian history. More than 50 people were killed and approximately 70 percent of the houses were wiped from the ground. The aftermath of the event saw a mass evacuation of Darwin’s inhabitants to other parts of the country. Within a short period of time, the population dropped from 45,000 to 10,000; many people never returned. Tracy is remembered for its high scale of destruction as well as its influence on the formulation of higher engineering standards for buildings in cyclone-prone areas.