134 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



THE LATEST CALABEIAN DISASTER 



By Professor WM. H. HOBBS 

 university of michigan 



~VT0W that more reliable accounts have reached us of the terrible 

 -i-^ disaster to Calabria and Sicily, it is possible to discuss some 

 larger facts which seem to be revealed with clearness. The grand 

 eruption of Etna, the disappearance of the Eolian islands, and other 

 equally improbable rumors, have ceased to be valuable scareheads in 

 the newspapers. The death loss it is still too early to properly esti- 

 mate, but on the basis of a well determined law of news reporting, 

 it is safe to say that the larger of the estimates will be much reduced. 

 Many that have been reported killed will eventually be classified among 

 the maimed and wounded, and many communes now supposed to be in 

 as great plight as their near neighbors, will be found either to have re- 

 ceived but slight damage or even to have remained immune. Such has, 

 at least, been the history of the earlier Calabrian earthquakes. 



A number of large towns at first reported destroyed as a result 

 of the Calabrian earthquake of September 8, 1905, the writer found 

 on visiting them a few weeks later had escaped without injury of any 

 kind. The reported death roll fell from many thousand to 3,000, then 

 to 1,500, and finally to 529, the last figure, that of the official count by 

 communes. 



Yet, notwithstanding this history there seems no reason to doubt 

 that the death loss from the recent shocks will mount far into the 

 tens of thousands. The greatest of previous disasters from this cause 

 within the same region occurred in February and March, 1783, at 

 which time the death roll was 29,515 (as finally counted by villages) 

 and the property loss $26,000,000. This was, however, one of the 

 greatest earthquake disasters of history, for recent extended studies 

 by Woehle have shown that Lyell's estimate of 60,000 for the deaths 

 caused by the Lisbon earthquake of 1755 should be divided in half. 

 In this instance the estimates of deaths which were made at the time 

 ranged all the way from 25,000 to 150,000. 



One can not read of the rush of Italy's king and queen to the 

 succor of their pitiably afflicted subjects, and of their remaining among 

 them with considerable danger to themselves, without realizing that 

 there is much of the heroic in it. The traditions of an almost parental 

 relationship to their subjects, have thus been well maintained through 



