Four hurricanes brushed the Islands in 2004.

Ivan, the most powerful hurricane to hit the region in a decade, strengthened into category 4 as it struck Grenada, bringing sustained winds of 220 kilometres per hour.

Then, in 1980, there was a hurricane, Hurricane Allen.

Mexico normally experienced numerous hurricanes in the Yucatán peninsula.

We were faced with many hurricanes, floods and earthquakes all over the world.

. Each year, several hurricanes struck the Caribbean, sometimes causing damage amounting to billions of United States dollars (e.g. Hurricane Gilbert in 1988 and Hurricane Hugo in 1989).

The hurricanes that struck the Caribbean in the fall of 2004 and that revisited in 2005 in the form of Hurricanes Katrina and Wilma were the strongest in a decade.

Allow me also to have a special thought for the victims of Hurricane Katrina, which recently struck the Gulf Coast of the United States indiscriminately and with rare violence.

Since 1987, Bangladesh had suffered two major floods and a severe cyclone.

And nowhere was this brought home more than during Hurricane Sandy. So what you had in Hurricane Sandy was a superstorm, the likes of which we hadn't seen for a long time, hitting the iPhone capital of the universe and you got volumes of media like we'd never seen before.

But 10 months later, on July 14 2005, another hurricane, Emily, hit Grenada.

Hurricane Jeanne hit Haiti, killing an estimated 1,500 people. Another 300,000 were injured or suffered property damage.

We had to engineer it to move gracefully in an average breeze and survive in hurricane winds.

Our warm regards go out to the people of the United States, which has been battered by Hurricane Katrina.

Bangladesh was often subjected to floods during the monsoon season, and the densely populated coastal areas often had to bear the brunt of cyclones.

A number of hurricanes hit the Caribbean between August and October 2004, causing substantial damage.

As we speak, a severe hurricane is once again pounding Grenada, causing severe damage.

As reported in last year's working paper (A AC.109 2004 14), in September 2003, Bermuda was hit by hurricane Fabian, which was the most powerful hurricane to hit the Territory in over 50 years.

I couldn't build this the way I knew because hand tied knots weren't going to withstand a hurricane.

When tsunamis, hurricanes or earthquakes strike and cause destruction, we act swiftly at least in most cases.

We wish to express to the Government and the people of the United States of America our sincerest condolences following Hurricane Katrina.

Other panellists spoke of similar experiences of devastation and vulnerability after hurricane Ivan hit the Caribbean in 2004.

His own region of the Pacific had not been spared the small island of Niue had been literally devastated by Cyclone Heta in January and a typhoon had lashed the Micronesian island of Yap in April.

The devastating cyclones that had recently engulfed the region had again demonstrated the serious consequences of disrupting the ecological balance.

An attentive national government would surely have realized that the Gulf region of the United States is more vulnerable to high energy hurricanes. Indeed, Hurricane Katrina was the third most intense hurricane ever to make landfall in the US.

We were caught in a storm.

From this rostrum, I would like to express my sincerest sympathy for the afflicted populations of the southern part of the United States of America that have been so tragically affected by the passage of Hurricane Katrina in August, one of the most devastating hurricanes ever to strike our continent.

In 2008, Cyclone Nargis devastated Myanmar.

Of course, earthquakes and all the natural phenomena floods, tornadoes, etc. take their toll.

Last year many Caribbean countries were battered by hurricanes, and the Eastern Caribbean nation of Grenada was in the unfortunate situation of facing the onslaught of two major hurricanes in one calendar year.

It was just in July this year that our sister CARICOM nation of Grenada again suffered serious devastation, caused by Hurricane Emily, on the back of last year's devastation brought by Hurricane Ivan.

When Grenada was hit by Hurricane Ivan in September of 2004, it was the entire 344 square kilometre island, with its 100,000 inhabitants, that sustained damage.

Hurricane

CO So tornadoes don't happen in Massachusetts.

Like cyclones coming up toward Bangladesh.

Just a month ago, before Hurricane Katrina hit, a hurricane specialist from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Kerry Emmanuel, published a paper in the British science magazine Nature, showing that tropical storms are now lasting one and a half times longer than they did just a few decades earlier, with spinning winds that are now 50 per cent more powerful.

Flurry

This year's hurricane season hit my country very hard.

It's rare for a tropical depression to hit Arizona, but that's exactly what's likely to happen early happen early next week as Hurricane Rosa's remaining energy tracks across the Desert Southwest, delivering flash flooding risks.

It is a well known fact that during the June November period the region is prone to hurricanes, storms, floods and mudslides that from November to June it can suffer droughts and forest fires and that during any one year period beginning in June, it can be hit by volcanic eruptions, earthquakes and tidal waves.

Similarly, Gurría tells us that Hurricane Sandy, which slammed into New York City in 2012, is an example of inaction on climate change, costing the United States the equivalent of 0.5 of its GDP each year. In fact, the US currently is experiencing the longest absence of intense landfall hurricanes since records began in 1900, while the adjusted damage cost for the US during this period, including Hurricane Sandy, has fallen slightly.

Rome mighty and alone, the winds of destruction blow down upon thee!

A Democratic Hurricane

By a whirlwind.

Our hearts go out to those unfortunate Americans and citizens of other countries who lost everything, including loved ones, in the devastation that Hurricane Katrina has wrought.