Worst man-made environmental disasters revealed

The fallout from the North Sea oil tanker collision on March 10 may have you reflecting on other significant man-made environmental disasters

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Whether through accident or negligence, humanity has caused significant environmental damage to the Earth.

However, this is not the only instance where human activity has had a potentially catastrophic impact on local environments and wildlife.

Here’s a closer look at some of the most infamous man-made disasters in history.

Exxon Valdez

The Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989

Flickr, licensed under CC BY 2.0

The Exxon Valdez tanker ran aground in Prince William Sound, Alaska, in March 1989.

This resulted in an estimated 11 million gallons of oil spilling into the water, sparking a massive clean-up operation.

The disaster had catastrophic effects on local wildlife, killing an estimated 250,000 seabirds, 2,800 sea otters, 300 harbour seals and numerous other animals. It also severely impacted local fisheries and tourism due to the contamination of over 1,300 miles of coastline.

The environmental and economic damage took years to recover from, and the incident remains one of the worst oil spills in history.

BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

In April 2010, an oil well on BP's Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, killing 11 people and causing a leak of 134 million gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico

Roughly 20 years after the Exxon Valdez oil spill came the BP Deepwater Horizon oil incident, which became the largest accidental marine oil spill in history.

In April 2010, an oil well on BP's Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, killing 11 people and leaking 134 million gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. It is estimated that the spill harmed or killed thousands of marine species, including sea turtles, whales, dolphins, birds, and fish.

It took 87 days for responders to cap the well and stop the oil from flowing into the Gulf. Clean-up efforts continued for several years.

The disaster was later dramatised in the 2016 film Deepwater Horizon, starring Mark Wahlberg.

Kuwaiti oil fires

Oil well fires rage outside Kuwait City in the aftermath of Operation Desert Storm

NARA & DVIDS Public Domain Archive, licensed under PDM 1.0

In 1991, between 600 and 730 oil wells were set alight at the end of the Persian Gulf War as part of Operation Desert Storm. The fires were deliberately ignited by retreating Iraqi forces in January and February 1991. This was considered one of the worst acts of environmental sabotage in history.

The first oil well fires were not extinguished until early April, and the last well was finally capped on November 6 of the same year. Smoke and ash engulfed much of the region, creating a thick, toxic cloud large enough to be captured by satellites.

The fires burned for months, releasing vast amounts of carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide and other pollutants into the atmosphere. This severely affected air quality and contributed to acid rain.

The environmental and economic consequences were devastating. Millions of barrels of crude oil were lost, and the burning wells contaminated land and water sources, impacting local ecosystems for years. The disaster also posed serious health risks, with reports of respiratory illnesses among residents and military personnel in the affected areas.

The Kuwaiti oil fires have since been studied as an example of the long-term environmental impact of warfare. They remain one of the largest oil-related disasters in history.

The Gulf of Mexico’s dead zone

Oil sheen on the surface of the Gulf of Mexico

A long-running man-made disaster persists in the Gulf of Mexico, where years of pesticide runoff, industrial waste and toxic chemicals entering the Mississippi River have created a so-called ‘dead zone’.

This area has such low oxygen levels that most marine life cannot survive, and it reappears each summer due to continued pollution.

Scientists monitor its size annually, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimating it covered 6,705 square miles in 2024.

Love Canal

An abandoned car park in Love Canal, Niagara Falls

Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC0 1.0

Between the 1940s and 1950s, 21,000 tonnes of toxic waste were dumped in the abandoned settlement of Love Canal, near Niagara Falls, by the Hooker Chemical Company.

Decades later, hazardous chemicals, including benzene and dioxins, began seeping into residents' backyards and cellars, causing widespread health issues such as birth defects, cancer and respiratory illnesses. The crisis ultimately forced the evacuation of hundreds of families in the 1970s and led to the area being declared a federal disaster zone.

The Love Canal disaster became a landmark case in environmental regulation. It influenced the creation of the US Superfund programme in 1980, which provides funding for cleaning up hazardous waste sites.

Door to Hell

The crater in Turkmenistan has become a bizarre yet popular tourist attraction

Unsplash

In 1971, Soviet scientists drilling for oil near the village of Derweze in Turkmenistan accidentally exposed a massive underground gas pocket, causing the ground to collapse into a crater. Fearing the release of dangerous methane gas, they set it alight, believing it would burn off within a few days. However, more than five decades later, the flames are still burning, earning the site its ominous nickname—the ‘Door to Hell’.

The crater, measuring approximately 230 feet (70 metres) wide and 98 feet (30 metres) deep, has become a bizarre yet popular tourist attraction, drawing visitors from around the world. Despite its eerie glow and persistent flames, Turkmenistan’s government has considered extinguishing the fire in recent years due to environmental concerns and gas resource management.

Chernobyl

Caused by a failed safety test at Reactor No. 4, the accident led to the immediate evacuation of tens of thousands of residents from the nearby city of Pripyat

PA Archive

Perhaps the most infamous nuclear disaster in history, the explosion at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant on April 26, 1986, released vast amounts of radioactive material into the atmosphere. This contaminated large parts of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia.

Caused by a failed safety test at Reactor No. 4, the accident led to the immediate evacuation of tens of thousands of residents from the nearby city of Pripyat and surrounding areas.

Regarded as the worst nuclear disaster ever, Chernobyl's Exclusion Zone—spanning approximately 1,000 square miles (roughly the size of Luxembourg)—remains in place nearly 40 years later due to lingering radiation. However, in a remarkable twist, wildlife has reclaimed the area, with species such as wolves, lynxes and even endangered Przewalski’s horses thriving in the absence of human activity.

Despite the dangers, Chernobyl has become an unlikely tourist destination. Supervised tours allow visitors to explore the eerie remains of Pripyat and the now-sarcophagus-covered reactor that changed the course of nuclear history.

Fukushima

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant started releasing treated radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean in 2011

via REUTERS

Another catastrophic nuclear disaster occurred in 2011 at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Japan. Triggered by the devastating 9.0-magnitude Tōhoku earthquake and subsequent tsunami on March 11, the disaster caused a total electrical grid failure, disabling almost all of the plant’s backup power sources. Without cooling systems, three of the plant’s six reactors suffered meltdowns, releasing vast amounts of radioactive material into the atmosphere and ocean.

The Fukushima disaster forced the evacuation of more than 150,000 people from surrounding areas, many of whom were never able to return due to radiation contamination.

In the years since, extensive decontamination efforts have been undertaken, and Japan has gradually lifted evacuation orders in some regions. However, the long-term effects of radiation exposure and the plant's ongoing decommissioning — expected to take decades — continue to spark debate, particularly regarding the controlled release of treated wastewater into the Pacific Ocean.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Rubbish collected from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Ocean Cleanup Project

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is one of the most alarming ongoing environmental disasters caused by human waste. Located between Hawaii and California, this vast accumulation of marine debris is primarily composed of plastic waste, discarded fishing gear and microplastics. It has formed due to the North Pacific Gyre (NPG), a system of ocean currents that traps debris within a swirling vortex.

Covering an estimated 1.6 million square kilometres (617,763 square miles) — roughly three times the size of France — the patch is not a solid island of trash but rather a dense soup of floating plastics, many of which have broken down into tiny, nearly invisible fragments. These microplastics pose a severe threat to marine life, as fish, birds, and other sea creatures mistake them for food, leading to injury, poisoning, and starvation.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is just one of several massive garbage accumulations in the world's oceans. This highlights the urgent need for better waste management and international efforts to reduce plastic pollution.

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