http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=noaa-chief-2011-was-harbi SAN FRANCISCO -- The United States was battered this year by at least 12 natural disasters that each caused at least $1 billion in damages, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said yesterday.
The agency said it was adding a June tornado outbreak in the Midwest and Southeast and record-setting wildfires in Texas, Arizona and New Mexico to a list that also includes flooding along the Missouri and Mississippi rivers, drought in the Southern Plains and southwestern United States, five previous tornado outbreaks in Southern and central states, and a blizzard.
That count could still rise, because NOAA is still tallying damages from Tropical Storm Lee and a late October snowstorm in the Northeast.
But this year was not an aberration, NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco said during a speech here yesterday.
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